


Retribution

by wild_moors



Category: Sword Art Online (Anime & Manga)
Genre: AU-ish near the end, Comfort, Fighting, Fluff and Angst, Found Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Knights of the Blood Oath, KoB is one big family, Loss, Minor Character Death, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, but mostly canon compliant, he's lonely too, mentor!Heathcliff, most of them - Freeform, player-killing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:42:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 21
Words: 101,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23700259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wild_moors/pseuds/wild_moors
Summary: The Knights of the Blood Oath started out just like any other guild—friends who found family in each other. Karma is one of them.She didn't expect any of this when she put on the NerveGear. She didn't expect to have to fight so many vicious monsters, not all of them AIs, nor did she expect to find a family she would move heaven and earth for. When the guilt becomes too much to bear, they pick her back up, and they remind her of what it is to be human.In other words, I couldn't find enough Heathcliff-centric stories, so I made one for myself.Sequel is up!
Relationships: Heathcliff & OC, Kirigaya Kazuto | Kirito/Yuuki Asuna | Asuna (mentioned), Yuuki Asuna | Asuna & OC
Comments: 58
Kudos: 28
Collections: Favourite Fanfictions





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> If you've already seen this, that's because I reuploaded the story. Had to change some things. I'm still relatively new to all this, so please bear with me :)
> 
> Disclaimer: SAO belongs to Reki Kawahara, not me.
> 
> The Knights of the Blood are pretty much one big family, and you can't tell me otherwise. Mostly, I just wanted to write something about Heathcliff, and making OCs is my hobby, and found family is one of my favorite tropes (along with unrequited love), so this is what came about. This is not a romance story, more of a family story, although Kirito and Asuna do make appearances.
> 
> Italics are usually flashbacks or past dialogue, occasionally thoughts. Bracketed italics are system messages from the game.
> 
> NOTE: Personally, I like to visualize while reading, especially in fight scenes, so I'll just add that Karma is left-handed.

_** Meeting: 2/28/2023 ** _

Karma flops down on the bench with a sigh. “Why me again?”

“Because besides Heathcliff, you’re our best duellist, and he’s got to observe your challengers,” Kili, a fresh new recruit in his early twenties with a youthful countenance, informs her unhelpfully, and she groans, turning to Heathcliff.

“Aren’t any of them good enough?” she asks in exasperation. “Some of them weren’t half bad.”

“Half bad isn’t good enough. We can’t accept just anyone.”

She rolls her eyes. “Picky.”

Just then, someone else steps into the makeshift ring, and Godfree pats her on the back heartily. “Go get ‘em!” 

With a sigh, she meets her next challenger in the ring. To her surprise, it’s a girl, Karma’s first female challenger out of twenty-seven so far. Her auburn hair falls to her waist, and copper eyes glint in the sunlight.

“Hi,” Karma begins, smiling at her fellow female warrior. “What’s your name?”

She looked a little wary at first, but seems to relax a little at Karma’s friendly manner. “Asuna.”

“Nice to meet you. I’m Karma. Ready to duel?”

Asuna draws her weapon, a slim rapier, and Karma takes that as a yes. She sends Asuna a duel invite, and the brunette picks ‘one-strike mode’. Karma draws her own sword, and they assume their stances.

Unlike most of Karma’s previous challengers, Asuna refrains from attacking immediately. Her sharp gaze scans her opponent, assessing Karma carefully, and Karma hides a smile.

Finally, when Karma makes no move to attack, Asuna lunges in with a simple Linear attack, her rapier leaving behind a pink light trail. Their blades screech as Karma deflects the attack, but Asuna immediately unleashes a rapid-fire multi-hit move, her rapier moving blindingly fast. Oh, she’s the real deal alright.

Light bursts between them like fireworks, and Karma pivots quickly and lashes out. Asuna jumps back first, then is forced to use her sword to block Karma’s next few strikes, even as Karma nicks her avatar a few times.

They break apart, and Karma grins. “You’re speedy.”

“So are you,” Asuna pants, a competitive gleam in her eyes, before darting back in.

They continue their match for some more time, and Karma almost doesn’t want it to end. She draws it out, ignoring several openings for the fun of it and letting Asuna have more chances to prove her skill. It’ll be nice to have another girl in the guild, especially one her own age.

The match ends when Karma finally exploits one opening to slash a deep cut across Asuna’s shoulder. She stumbles to one knee, and the winner icon appears over Karma’s head. Cheering erupts from bystanders, and Karma helps Asuna up with a smile as the red pixels fade from their avatars.

“So, Asuna,” she says happily, “how would you like to join a guild?”

Asuna’s gaze flickers sideways, and her brow furrows in confusion, likely noting the lack of a guild symbol by Karma’s HP bar.

“We haven’t formed up yet,” she explains. “We want a little more momentum before bursting onto the front lines. That’s why I’ve been duelling--to find someone to add. What d’you say?” She quickly adds, “Of course, you don’t have to make up your mind to join right now. If you say yes, I’ll just take you to meet the others, and you can come on a few fights with us, see how you fit in.”

Her copper eyes brighten. “Okay, sure. Sounds great!”

“Awesome,” Karma says with a grin, clapping her hands together. “Right this way, then.”

\---

Heathcliff looks mildly put-off. “I didn’t-”

“If you had your way, I would’ve been duelling for the next six months,” she cuts him off, placing a hand on her hip. “Trust me, she’ll be great. You’re not the one who fought her.” To a slightly unsure-looking Asuna, she adds, “Ignore him. Well, don’t, ‘cause he’ll be our leader, but just ignore him when I tell you to.” She winks, eliciting a small smile from Asuna, and a vaguely annoyed sigh from the commander. “I’ll introduce you to everyone.

“The guy with the beard is Godfree. He’s an axe-wielder, and the walking encyclopedia of bad dad jokes.”

“My jokes are wonderful!”

“Sure, which is why I’m the only one who pity-laughs, _after_ you explain them. Over there, that guy with the blue ponytail is Uzala, a glaive-wielder and our resident coffee addict.”

“Dude, that’s Heathcliff, are you kidding me?” “Nah. He drinks more coffee than you do, but you’re the one who throws a hissy fit when we run out of it. The squirt over there is Kili, knife-wielder-”

“Oi, who’re you calling a squirt? I’m older than you-”

“And shorter,” she reminds him cheekily. Asuna laughs, and Karma grins at her before gesturing at Heathcliff. “And that’s our leader, Heathcliff. He uses a sword and tower shield. Don’t let him intimidate you, because the scariest thing about him is that he never gets enough sleep.”

“Karma-”

She cheerfully overrides him. “The others are off doing their own thing, but you’ll meet them soon. They’re all guys, but don’t worry, they’re just dorks, like them.” She waves a hand at her comrades, who all look varying degrees of offended, and smiles at Asuna. “So, please introduce yourself!”

Asuna smiles and bows politely. “Hello, I’m Asuna. It’s nice to meet all of you.”

Everyone choruses a greeting with varying degrees of enthusiasm, and Karma grins. “Now let’s go kill something!”

\---

“Giant killer bunnies at six o’clock!”

At Kili’s warning cry, everyone whirls around instantly, and Asuna echoes dubiously, “Giant killer bunnies?”

Karma flashes a tight grin. “That’s just what we call them. It’s not their actual name. Hey, Heathcliff, these ones are ours!”

He glances back at them and lowers his shield. “Very well.”

Uzala pouts. “No fair. You got to fight the last ones too.”

She winks, gesturing for Asuna to step up beside her. “Gotta test out our new rookie. Next few are yours, though.”

The four giant bunnies, standing at around three meters each, lumber towards them on all fours, eyes shining red and fangs dripping blood. Karma grins at Asuna’s slightly disgusted expression. “Cute, aren’t they. We’ll hit the one in front together, then I’ll go left, so you take the other one, and we’ll team up on the last one. Be careful, ‘cause they can pivot and change directions pretty fast.”

“Got it.”

The two girls, easily the fastest members of the group, take off like bullets. Karma rushes in first, and the bunny’s eyes glow briefly as it zeroes in on her. At the last second, she darts to one side, then the other, causing it to falter. It takes a wild swipe at her with wicked claws, and she leaps over it neatly before driving her sword up its jaw. Grabbing its ear, she swings herself up onto its back, forcing it to stop and rear in place, just in time for Asuna to come flying in, rapier thrusting into its chest.

They make quick work of the next two individually, and Karma is pleased to see the brunette’s cool, razor-focused composure that she saw before during the duel. In fact, the glint in her coppery eyes seems even brighter than before.

Without waiting for Karma, she lunges for the last bunny, moving even faster than Karma can. Her arm and blade seem to blur as she unleashes a flurry of light, each leaving a gash of red on the creature. It chitters and squeaks indignantly, pivoting and lashing out in a blur with its back foot.

Asuna grunts as she’s caught off-guard, but Karma catches her with a tight arm around her waist. “Toldja,” she comments, smiling.

She smirks ruefully. “Took me by surprise.”

As the bunny pivots and begins charging them, Karma lunges in to meet the monster halfway. It pounces, fangs bared, but she dances neatly to the side with unerring precision. In a blur of steel, she lops one of its paws off and shoves it off-balance with a neat horse kick.

Asuna doesn’t need a signal and darts in, charging up a simple linear attack with a shout. The bunny lurches to its remaining feet, but it’s too slow. In a shower of light and pixels, the monster bursts into shards.

As Asuna is reading the experience pop-up, Karma suddenly cheers, “We broke it!”

From where the others are watching, Nautilus complains, “Man, really?!”

Asuna glances at Karma, furrowing her brow in confusion. “What did we break?”

“The current standing record in our group for being the fastest to dispose of a group of killer bunnies,” she explains cheerfully. “Last one was Kili and Nautilus taking one minute and four seconds to beat a group of three.” Her grin turns a touch smug. “We just took down four in one minute flat.”

A wide grin spreads across Asuna’s face, widening further at the good-natured complaints of the previous record holders. Warmth kindles in her chest as she high-fives Karma, and they continue on their way with a cheerful bounce in their steps.

\---

The other inn patrons are still giving them weird looks by the time Heathcliff gets Karma to shut up, by covering her mouth (or trying to, at least) and placing one hand on her head firmly to keep her from bouncing literally off the walls. She’s still practically vibrating in her seat with excitement, though, and Asuna grins shyly.

“As you can probably tell,” Heathcliff says, shooting Karma an exasperated look before looking at Asuna again, “we’re glad to have you, Asuna-kun.”

“I’m just so excited!” Karma squeaks out, and Heathcliff rolls his eyes, lifting his hand from her head.

“Really,” he deadpans. “We couldn’t tell.”

Karma beams dazzlingly at Asuna, whose grin widens. “So, if you don’t mind me asking, how did you join the group, Karma?”

For all of a split second, her smile stutters, trips over a crack in the sidewalk, the past pushing up insistently through the present.

“Ehehe...Seems unlikely, huh?” she chuckles, smiling a bit wider. “Actually, it wasn’t even really a group. It was just Godfree, Uzala, and this grumpy guy right here.”

Heathcliff gives her a look and explains to Asuna, “The three of us formed up when the game started, after meeting out in the fields of the Town of Beginnings. We met Karma later.”

“Oh, wow…”

“Yeah.” Karma props her elbows up on the table with a long exhale. “I got stuck out in the fields by myself one day. I think it was the fifth day of the game...I’d never been alone out there, and I would’ve died if they didn’t save me. They took me with them, and I’ve just…” She offers a shrug. “...been with them ever since.”

“I can’t imagine,” Asuna admits, not quite sure herself what she’s referring to.

Karma smiles dryly. “Can’t imagine what? The almost dying?”

“Well, no, not that.” It’s a bit sad that ‘almost dying’ is not something she has to imagine. “I was thinking...well, just travelling in such a small group in general when you’re so different from everyone else.”

Karma hums, exchanging a thoughtful glance with Heathcliff. “Hmm, I guess you have a point. But the way I see it, we’re all stuck in this game. We’re all players.”

“Yeah, but…You still come from different backgrounds and stuff, right?”

“Well, yeah, I mean...It’s hard to explain. But you’ve seen those little kids in this game, right? Those grade school age kids?”

Asuna’s expression sobers, and she nods.

“Right, well, even they can pick up a sword and fight on the front lines if they developed the right skills and got the right equipment,” Karma explains with a shrug. “In theory, at least. So things like race and age and gender don’t really matter here.”

“That’s an interesting way of thinking about it…”

Karma grins and adds, “I will say, though, looking back, if I hadn’t been so completely out of it for the first few days, I would’ve found it really awkward. By the time I started getting back to normal, it _was_ my normal.”

Heathcliff glances at her with a vague expression of amusement. “Speaking of, I was initially surprised by how willing you were to trust three strangers. Not to mention, we had to room together for a while.”

Karma scrunches her face up at him and kicks him hard under the table for good measure, eliciting a flat glare. “When you put it like that, it just sounds weird!” she complains.

Asuna stares at them, blinking. “Wait, really?”

She rolls her eyes. “It was just for practicality’s sake. There were four of us, and only three of us had any substantial amount of col. It just made sense to share rooms.”

“Still, you had literally just met us,” Heathcliff says flatly, and she pouts at him.

“What do you want me to say, that it was a mistake to trust you? ‘Cause I haven’t seen much proof that it was,” she argues good-naturedly.

“I’m just saying, did no one ever teach you about stranger danger?”

Karma grins cheerfully at him, waving a hand. “Aww, come on, I knew you guys wouldn’t hurt me. Call it instinct.”

He stares at her with an impressive poker face expression. “That’s a blatant lie.”

“Okay, okay…” She stretches out her arms on the table with a nonchalant sigh before knitting her fingers together under her chin. “I mean, I did almost die, and I was pretty dazed. And you did just save my life.”

She glances at Heathcliff then out of the corner of her eye, chin resting on steepled fingers, a soft, lazy smile curling at her lips, and Asuna swallows hard. There’s a whole ocean of memories in those eyes, and simple, unwavering loyalty. The scope of her devotion to him is hard to fathom. She might follow him a little blindly, but he hasn’t given any of them a reason to doubt.

And there’s always a professional distance between the two, but also a friendly closeness that the others don’t share with the leader. It’s clear that Karma thinks highly of and respects him, but she’s definitely not afraid to laugh at him and poke fun at him, as she has multiple times just today. What’s even more surprising is that Heathcliff, who always comes off as solemn, stern, and strictly all-business to Asuna (despite Karma’s light-hearted introduction of him), doesn’t seem to mind it either, and pays it back in kind in his own way.

Outwardly, they only show it in more private settings, but Asuna has seen the two of them hold entire conversations solely through eye contact and microexpressions. On the one hand, it can be _really_ funny watching them just stare at each other for entire minutes on end like they’re having some kind of passive-aggressive staring contest. On the other hand, it can be _really_ annoying when they forget no one else can understand them.

The other guys come trooping in all at once, talking over one another loudly and all of them somehow managing to follow the scattered conversation perfectly. Karma slides right into the conversation with familiar ease, chatting with them as if she’s known them all her life, and they welcome her with boisterous laughter and enthusiasm.

During dinner, Asuna mostly listens, and makes some slightly awkward small talk with Kili, who, besides Karma, is the closest to her in age. Eventually, the NPC minstrel group strikes up a lively tune, and Karma and some of the guys go cavorting off to the dance floor.

To Asuna, who has spent her whole life being taught social etiquette and the importance of class and how to smile when she never meant it, it’s hard to fathom being able to be so close with people who are clearly so radically different, even if they’re all in the same situation. She almost sort of envies the ability.

“Something on your mind, Asuna-kun?”

She turns to see Heathcliff watching her with his cool, bottomless gray gaze. “Oh...I was just thinking.” Her gaze flickers to the lithe figure dancing literal circles around Uzala and his two left feet, and she mumbles, “She’s kind of amazing.”

Asuna is surprised to hear a low chuckle come from the stoic commander, and she turns to see him looking at the figures on the dance floor--well, one in particular--with a certain kind of lackadaisical fondness in his gaze. “She is,” he agrees in all seriousness, the firelight reflected in his eyes. “I’m lucky to have her.” He takes a sip of coffee. “Don’t tell her I said that.”

The brunette’s lips twitch in a small smile. “Oh, I think she knows already.”

As if summoned by a magic spell, Karma comes skipping over to them then, face flushed with cheer. “Hey, quit moping around! Let’s dance!”

On a whim, Asuna chugs the rest of her iced tea and stands up. “Let’s do it!”

She beams, linking arms with her fellow girl enthusiastically. “That’s my girl!”

Expectantly, she holds out a hand to the commander, as if giving an order, with bright eyes and pearlescent teeth and rosy red high in her cheeks, brimming with confidence.

With a sigh, Heathcliff reaches out to take her hand, allowing her to pull him onto the floor with a cheer. He is a natural leader, but she is something else.

\---

_** Reason: 11/11/2022 ** _

Breathing is unnecessary in this world, but Karma still feels like she can’t drag enough oxygen into her lungs.

The world is tinted red as her HP bar blares alarmingly at her from the corner of her eye, only a tiny chunk of red remaining, and it keeps going down because of DOT from the throwing pick lodged in her shoulder. Through a haze of terror, she reaches around with fumbling fingers to yank out the throwing pick and stumbles up the hill, searching desperately; when she sees a flicker of light in the distance, she throws herself into running towards it. If she can just reach the safe zone-

Her foot snags, and she goes down hard in a shower of dirt, her knife flying out of her hand. Footsteps thud menacingly towards her, as loud as a horse galloping, and she whirls around with a terrified bleat as a huge shadow blots out the moon.

A streak of crimson suddenly slams into the dire wolf, sending it careening sideways. A tall, muscular figure stands between her and the dire wolf, shield and sword brandished protectively, and two more figures are approaching, weapons drawn.

The dire wolf lunges, and the first catches its claws on his shield, barely giving ground beneath the ferocious attack. One of his comrades darts in, slashing deep across the beast’s flank with his sword, and it rears up with a snarl.

The first man whirls around to face the third. “Now!”

The third swings his axe above his head, a bright golden sword (axe) skill charging up before he brings it down on the dire wolf’s neck with a fierce bellow. The beast throws back its head, writhing, and lets loose a long, reverberating howl before it shatters.

In a clatter of armor, the first player she saw kneels down next to her as he sheathes his sword. He helps her sit up, gray eyes glinting with a solemn intensity.

“Are you okay?” His voice is a rich tenor, with an iron will.

Karma manages a shaky nod, completely wordless and numb, and he picks up her knife, handing it back hilt-first. She takes it automatically, and nausea rolls in her stomach. An awful mixture of fury and grief roars from deep inside her chest, and she holds the weapon close to her chest as a sob bursts out of her, choked and ugly.

The hand supporting her on the shoulder squeezes gently. “Come on. We’ll bring you back to the town.”

She doesn’t remember the trip back. Doesn’t recall the respawned monsters on the way that the trio fights off with ease. She just remembers following that man, and his steel gray ponytail and calm, authoritative demeanor.

Later, she’ll learn his name is Heathcliff. On a whim, she asks him to help her become stronger.

When he unexpectedly says yes, that’s the moment she finds a new reason to live in this world.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Stranded: 3/12/2023**_

Karma grits her teeth as Asuna's rapier bounces near harmlessly off of the scorpion boss's shell, and the brunette nearly doesn't leap out of the way in time as the stinger comes smashing down, embedding into the stone with a mighty _CRACK!_

She squints as the scorpion yanks its stinger out, pieces of an idea forming in her mind, and she darts in. "Asuna, let's bait the tail again! Everyone, get back!"

Asuna glances at her with a mild expression of confusion before nodding, and the two girls charge in while everyone else falls back. The two lightest and fastest members of the party weave around the giant scorpion with superhuman speed, rolling and diving and skidding out of the path of its many weapons—huge clicking mouthparts, serrated crushing pincers, its many legs that are each as tall as the two of them, and that lashing tail.

_SMASH!_

The stinger slams down again, and Karma wastes no time in charging up a sword skill and swinging with every ounce of strength in her virtual body at the weak connection between the stinger and the rest of its armored tail. It screeches, but manages to yank its stinger out of the ground, and Karma growls in frustration at the tiny bit that the stinger is still hanging on by.

"Heathcliff, cover me!" she yells before charging back in.

She slides neatly under one of the pincers while the other is met with Heathcliff's tower shield. As it ricochets with a loud, grinding screech off of the steel, Asuna darts in, striking at the joint of the pincer. Meanwhile, Karma jumps as high as she can over the clicking mouthparts and lands on its back, stabbing her sword as deep as she can into one of its two larger eyeballs.

Asuna whips her gaze up to see the tail rearing back again. "Karma!"

With a hard pull, she yanks her sword out of the eyeball as the stinger descends and coolly slashes once with a surgeon's precision.

 _KSSHK!_ The stinger is severed with one strike and not even a sword skill needed, and it dissolves into polygons. The scorpion reels, and Karma sways precariously. "Asuna!"

She leaps off of the shell, tucking into a roll as she hits the ground, and Asuna rushes in like a lightning bolt, her path covered by the rest of the party. Bright pink light momentarily explodes within the chamber as she lunges, rapier extended in front of her-

-and plunges her sword into the other eyeball up to the handle.

The death SFX plays, and Asuna hits the ground in a crouch, sword still extended. Menus pop up in front of each player, displaying how much experience was earned and if they got any items.

The others cheer, and Karma walks over to Asuna. The two girls share a high-five and a grin, eyes bright with excitement.

Suddenly, a low rumble reverberates through the chamber, causing everyone to fall into silence for a moment, completely still. Karma raises her sword again, breathing quickening.

It's Godfree that realizes what's happening first. "The floor!"

They all look down to see the cracks from the scorpion stinger widening and fissuring further along the sandstone floor—right under Asuna's feet, as it happens. Before Karma can think about it, she's tackling the brunette out of the way. As she lands heavily on the ground herself, she feels it give way beneath her, and the last thing she sees is Asuna reaching a hand out with a wordless cry before it turns to darkness.

The air gusting past Karma as she freefalls steals all the breath from her artificial lungs, and she struggles to regain some semblance of control. She quickly sheathes her sword, not wanting to lose her grip on it, and fumbles in her pocket for her teleport crystal.

And then she hits the water. Cold rushes up to engulf her in an instant, and she chokes out a stream of bubbles, thrashing wildly. The current slams mercilessly into her, forcing her to surrender whatever control she might have over her own movements. A silent grunt escapes her as she's smashed into something hard—the wall, or a passing boulder, maybe?—before continuing to be dragged along by the current.

Her HP bar ticks down steadily from the lack of air—this is the one exception in which breathing actually matters. Karma tries desperately to recall something of her years of swimming, but she's never swam in such a heavy current—she's never even swam outside of a pool. Totally helpless, all she can do is watch her HP bar tick from green to yellow, marching steadily towards red.

Enraged frustration surges inside her hotly, and she returns to flailing about with renewed vigor. This is not where she's going to die, a hundred meters below ground in the middle of nowhere with no one to know. The difference between the virtual and real world is that drowning in game doesn't do anything except decrease HP, so she still has the strength and clarity of mind to move and thrash about-

And suddenly, she hits land. The water practically spits her out onto the sand, leaving her as a heap of drenched clothes, soaked to the bone. Coughing and spitting reflexively, Karma forces herself up onto her forearms and rubs her eyes with the heels of her hands before reaching for her teleport crystal-

Only to discover that she doesn't have it anymore. She'll never admit to panic, but there's a distinct sense of dread as she pats herself down quickly and realizes that she must've lost her grip on it in the water, and that she doesn't have another. Her hand flies to her sword, and she breathes a sigh of relief when she touches the handle. At least not all hope is lost.

Groaning, she stands up and takes stock of her situation. The river continues on into darkness and comes from a tunnel further up, and Karma can't see any traversable path in either direction. Looking behind her, she can see a tunnel sloping downwards into more darkness.

She pulls up her menu and locates Heathcliff. He's in the chamber adjacent to the one that caved in, but she can't message him, as is expected with both of them still in a dungeon. What are they thinking? Her HP bar still shows the others' beneath it, so the same goes for them. They must've seen her HP going down as she nearly drowned.

She bites her lip in agitation. This is the first time she's really been apart from him since they met.

"Ugh, get ahold of yourself," she mutters, slapping her cheeks a few times with the palms of her hands. "You're not that helpless girl he found in the fields on Floor 1." And she is going to make it back to them alive.

With that in mind, she chugs a healing potion, grimacing at the sour taste, and drops it to the ground, letting it dissolve. Trying to ignore the bone-deep chill of her soaking clothes, she draws her sword and treks into the tunnel.

\---

"We have to find a way down there," Asuna is saying, pacing back and forth agitatedly. Karma's HP has stopped going down, and has started going back up, but that doesn't make the situation much better.

"But we've already mapped out this whole dungeon extensively," Uzala says aloud to himself, scowling in frustration. "We didn't find anything like that."

"Then we'll look again! We can't leave her down there. She'll run out of supplies sooner or later."

Heathcliff clears his throat, and everyone turns to face him, falling silent. "We'll press on to the next town and wait for her there." He holds up a hand to forestall the others' indignant protests. "Even if we did find a safe way down, there's no way to pin down her exact location when we don't have the map data of whatever lower levels she's in, and we can't message her either. If we go down there ourselves, we might just miss her, and that won't help anyone. She's still partied with us, and we'll take turns keeping an eye on her on our maps. If she makes it out, we'll know."

And she dies, they'll know that too.

He can see the torment and frustration and helplessness on the others' faces. It's not just that they've temporarily lost a comrade and valued fighter, it's that they've temporarily lost a good friend who's now in peril by herself, and they can't do anything for her. And no matter how strong she is, the odds are still stacked against her.

\---

Karma's not sure how long she's been down here. Next time she's in town, she resolves to get herself a watch. Her internal clock is probably going to be screwed over by the time she makes it out.

It's been at least a day or two, she reasons, since she got stranded, but she can't tell. All she knows is that she's exhausted, but it's too cold to be sleeping, since her clothes are still damp. She took off her boots and socks in an attempt to dry them out faster and lessen the discomfort at first, but then she ran into the monsters—a weird breed of giant bugs with too many legs. Stepping on them with her bare feet was _not_ something she wanted to do, so she quickly put her boots back on and tried to ignore the cold squishing.

She has made pretty much zero progress. She started a new map and is trying to find a way out of these endless sand and dirt tunnels, but there seems to be no end to them. Most of them are a relatively comfortable height and width, but some of them are so tight she can barely squeeze by even if she turns sideways. Her aimless adventuring has led her in circles several times already. She hasn't slept for fear of getting mauled in her sleep by monsters, she's thirsty, and her stomach is growling loudly at her, which she tries to ignore. The only salvation is that the tunnels are dimly lit by flickering torches every few meters, so at least she's not stumbling around in complete darkness.

She checked her friends list and tracked Heathcliff and Asuna, and she's been doing so every so often (how often, she has no idea without a clock). She'll see them in the next town for a while at a time, then they're back in the fields and the dungeon. The party is probably staying the night there and then venturing back into the fields to look for another way down. At least she hasn't been forgotten about. Looking at her friends menu makes her lonely, though.

Scowling at her map, she looks up and around when she comes to an intersection of sorts. Suddenly, she realizes that she hasn't gone a certain way, and she heads down that tunnel, hopeful despite herself.

The tunnel twists and winds for some time before she realizes she hears something. With a jolt, her ears pick up the sound of gurgling water, and she picks up the pace, eager for this change, whatever it might mean. She does keep a tight grip on her sword, though.

Soon, she rounds a sharp bend, and the tunnel opens wide. She finds herself standing on a sharp ledge that stretches both ways into darkness, and far beneath her, she can hear the water gurgling. A chasm splits through the earth in front of her, spanned by a rickety-looking wooden bridge. On the other side of a bridge, a larger cavern opens up, with several tunnels pockmarking the stone, and a teenage girl sitting against the cavern wall.

Her head of short brown hair snaps up when Karma steps onto the ledge, and for a second, both of them stare at each other.

The other girl suddenly scrambles to her feet, seeming to get ready to bolt, but Karma barks out, "Wait!"

She hesitates, shooting a look over her shoulder, and Karma continues with what she hopes is a reassuring, hopeful smile, "I'm another player. Can we maybe work together here?" She sounds desperate, but maybe that's a good thing. It might make the other girl more willing to work together.

Sure enough, she pauses and turns around warily. Her eyes rake over Karma's bedraggled state—damp clothes, disheveled hair—and she slowly relaxes. "How'd you get down here? When?"

"I fell. The floor of a dungeon above gave way after a fight, and I fell into the water. It carried me down here, and I've been wandering around these tunnels for a while. I can't say for sure how long, but I think at least a day or two."

The other girl is still wary, but she admits, "Same with me, for the most part. I think I've been down here for almost a week."

Her stomach growls loudly to emphasize the point. Karma makes a decision and pulls out her last bit of food—the cheap, stale bread that you can get for free at all towns from NPCs.

"Here," she says, breaking it in half. "This is all I have left, but if you want, we can share…?"

The food warms the other girl up to her remarkably. "I'm Rune," she says after scarfing down half the bread.

"I'm Karma." She pulls up her map. "Can we compare maps? You've probably seen more than I have."

Rune narrows her eyes slightly, but after a moment of hesitation, she pulls up her own maps. "Yeah...So I've explored a lot of this side of the bridge. I was just about to go over to the other side when you came out."

"Perfect. To be honest, I think I've been going around in circles for a long time."

"Me too. Have you fought any monsters?"

"Yeah, those weird centipede things?"

"Yeah, those. Ew. So, anyways." She scrolls along her map and taps a large chamber some distance away. "Here's what I think is one exit."

Karma nearly chokes on nothing. "Y-you found the exit?!"

"Don't get too excited," Rune sighs, propping her chin up on one hand. Her bracelet gleams in the low torchlight. "It's guarded by a huge scaly lizard boss. Really heavy armor, super high level. Even me swinging this baby-" She pats the war hammer on her back. "-doesn't do much against it. And the 'exit' I mentioned is just a door. I don't know if there are more tunnels on the other side of it or an actual way out. Didn't think it was worth using up all my remaining healing supplies, so I've been trying to find another exit."

Karma's heart is racing. "Can you take me there anyways? Maybe the two of us together can find a way out."

Rune stares at her skeptically for a few seconds. Then she tips her head back with a sigh. "Yeah, fine. Not like we have many other choices...We should probably rest first, though. Now that there's two of us, we can take turns keeping watch."

Karma is somewhat hesitant to put her safety in a stranger's hands. But she hasn't slept at all since she ended up down here, and from the sounds of it, neither has Rune. Besides, what would either of them have to gain by sabotaging the other?

Still, Karma only lightly dozes while Rune keeps watch, and she can tell Rune is doing the same while Karma keeps watch. Nothing happens, though, and after both of them are feeling slightly less exhausted, they push on, following Rune's map. Karma tries to make small talk, now that she has another human being to talk to.

"So do you have any other friends or family here?"

Rune heaves a long sigh. "My older brother. Last I checked, he was wandering around the fields or the town nearby."

"My party is doing the same. Probably looking for another entrance."

"Mmm."

The conversation dwindles, and Karma accepts the silence. If Rune's been down here for as long as she says, it's no wonder she doesn't feel much like talking more than necessary.

When they're attacked, Karma keeps an eye on Rune. She's a good fighter, maybe a few levels beneath Karma, but pretty strong with that hammer. Karma can tell Rune is watching her too.

Finally, they reach the chamber that Rune was talking about. The tunnels open up without warning, and Karma sucks in a sharp breath at the scope of the chamber. The ceiling soars so high that she can't see the top. Pillars stand at the sides of the chamber, arching up towards each other, except the middles are cracked and broken, so none of them ever meet. Pieces of stone lie scattered about, like the result of a giant throwing a temper tantrum with stone building blocks. The ground is sandstone brick, with a fine layer of sand blanketing it.

Karma is about to take another step when Rune drags her back by the shoulder. "If you take one more step, you'll trigger the boss," she warns, and Karma gulps. Rune points at an ornate, gold-inlaid door at the other end of the chamber. "That's the door I was talking about. No idea where it leads, though. You sure you wanna try a fight?"

She chews her lip in thought. "Does the lizard follow you back into the tunnels?"

"It's too big, so if you run fast enough, no."

Karma casts a dubious glance up at the tunnel they're standing in, which is about three to four meters tall. If the lizard is too big for this tunnel, how big is it? "Alright. I'd like to see for myself, then. You can stay back. Just get ready to run."

Rune shrugs and takes several big steps back. "Fine by me. Watch out for the tail. Swings like a whip. It's got a poisonous bite, too. It took me down a good quarter of my HP with the debuff alone. And don't expect me to lend you healing items."

She smirks briefly, gripping her sword tight. "Of course."

Karma takes a step forward, and on the far side of the chamber, the sand explodes.

Her first thought is, Rune wasn't kidding about the trigger threshold.

Her second is, that thing is enormous.

On first glance, it looks more like a wingless dragon than a lizard. Horns jut from its head, which is decidedly draconic, and armor-like plates cover its body, flexing and sliding with its movements. It lashes its spiked tail before lunging at her, maw open wide, and Karma leaps into action. She doesn't need to hit it to see that her sword isn't going to do anything against that armor, but there must be a weak spot somewhere. Maybe its eyes, like that scorpion she fought with the others? That feels like so long ago now.

When she targets the eyes, though, it simply closes them, and her sword bounces right off of the tough skin of its eyelids. Cursing under her breath, she skids along the sandy ground in a crouch. It slashes at her with its claws, and she tries to slash at the underside of its clawed foot; again, the blade does nothing, and she's sent flying into the wall with a choked grunt. A second later, she throws herself flat to the ground in time for its tail to smash into the wall, only a scant few centimeters above her, and she scrambles out of the way.

Its underbelly? But it stays pretty low to the ground, which eliminates that possibility. Half out of frustration, she hurls a throwing pick at it.

Instantly, it snaps its jaws shut and whips its head to the side, letting the pin glance off the scales with a metallic _plink!_

Oh.

She nearly doesn't dodge its tail in time. Once she's back on even footing, she yells, "I think we have to target its mouth!"

Rune's voice drifts faintly from somewhere behind her. "But its fangs are poisonous!"

"Well, that's probably why! Back me up!"

Soon, she hears footsteps underneath the din of the boss fight, and Rune comes flying in, bringing her hammer down hard on top of the lizard's head. It roars, stunned, and Karma charges up a sword skill and lunges, burying her sword hilt-deep in the roof of its mouth. She's delighted to see the HP bar go down about a quarter just from one hit, and she yanks her sword out and jumps back.

"It worked!" she shouts triumphantly. "Rune, switch in again!"

There's no response. "Rune?!"

Suddenly, the lizard whips around and charges away from Karma, for some reason, and she coughs at the abrupt wave of sand that was kicked up, stinging her eyes and throat.

"Dammit, why won't this open?!" Rune's frustrated voice demands from the other side of the chamber. "Come on, open, damn it-"  
Karma's eyes widen as the lizard barrels towards Rune, who's pounding on the door desperately. "Watch out!"

Through a haze of sand, she sees the other girl turn around—just in time for the lizard to slam its spiked tail into her, smashing her against the wall for a split second before she explodes into shards. She didn't even have time to scream.

Karma stares blankly, mouth agape. The monster huffs loudly and turns with heavy, lumbering steps, its red eyes now focused back on Karma.

What follows is a long, hard, uphill battle. Without Rune to switch in and out with, the monster pursues Karma only with a one-track determination. Several times, her health dips deep into the red before she can heal herself with what supplies she has left, her heart lurching at the multiple near-death instances.

When the monster finally dies, Karma stands there for who knows how long. Her sense of time has been completely obliterated from wandering the tunnels for so long.

Something shiny glints by the door. Somehow, Karma manages to get her legs to move. When she picks it up, she realizes instantly what it is.

Rune was about to leave her behind to die facing the boss while she escaped. It didn't work, and she paid the price.

Still, it's a price unfairly steep for anyone to pay.

Karma places a trembling hand on the door, and it slides open, revealing a staircase up. Taking a deep breath, she starts climbing, step after step, one foot in front of the other.

When she finds herself in the entrance chamber of the dungeon she fell from, natural light shining in from the entrance, she doesn't have it in her to cheer, or smile, or even cry.

\---

It's Kili's turn to be on 'Karma watch', and his voice cracks spectacularly several times as he wakes them all up, garbling urgently about how Karma just popped out of the dungeon after over three days. The sun has barely started to rise, but for once, everyone is wide awake as they sprint through town and into the fields, maps floating in front of each one of them. And when they see a lone silhouette trudging down a massive sand dune, not one of them doesn't smile, something inside of them giving way in sheer relief.

Of course, Asuna reaches her first, practically tackling her, sobbing, and Karma feels something acute break through the haze of exhaustion. The next few minutes are a blur of happy faces, teary faces, and before she knows it, she's shedding a few tears too. She must've put them through quite some stress, especially her party members, who got to watch her HP bar teeter up and down and plunge into the red several times during the last fight.

Heathcliff is standing back, but he steps forward when she breaks free of the group, a faint smile on even his typically stoic expression. Nearly stepping on his toes in her haste, she throws her arms around his broad shoulders without reservation. He holds her close, and she buries her face in his shoulder, melting into the warm safety he represents, and lets out a long exhale, taking all of her stress and anxiety and fear and worry over the last few days with it. It only lasts a second—they're alike that way; they don't like showing it in front of others—but she doesn't feel the cold anymore, and for the first time since she fell, she can close her eyes fully.

Maybe she might've made a 'Did you miss me?' quip if she wasn't so tired, but she opts for a more direct way of expression. "I missed you."

And of course, all he says is a neutral, "We missed you too." But his hand lingering on her shoulder says something more like, 'I missed you too.'

She smiles wearily again as she steps back, and he admits, "I was thinking of moving on to the next town. The others weren't having it, though."

Karma glances past him at the rising sun. "How long?" For all she knows, she could've been trapped in there only one night, or maybe seven.

He answers instantly. "Three days, four nights."

She breathes in deep and lets it out in one long sigh, biting her lip. "You should've left without me. That's a lot of time lost."

How long was Rune truly down there for? No wonder she was so desperate to get out. Karma can't bring herself to resent her, and the bracelet weighs heavily in her pocket.

He lets out a dry chuckle, surprising her slightly. "As if I could've convinced the others to leave you behind."

Asuna comes up beside her and links arms with her, beaming, her eyes still slightly overbright. "Come on, let's go eat breakfast. They serve the best pancakes."

She tries to push Rune out of her head and smiles. "Pancakes sound wonderful."

\---

Karma insists she's fine, but the others insist harder that she take the day to rest and recharge before they push on to the next town. And she can't resist much, so she agrees and spends the rest of the day sleeping, even though it's definitely not doing much for her internal clock.

Heathcliff comes in to ask if she wants dinner, and she yawns and mumbles something that she thinks sounds like a yes.

"By the way, there's a young man downstairs who wants to talk to you."

"Cute, not interested."

She hears a half-amused, half-exasperated snort. "It's about the dungeon you fell into. Apparently, the same happened to his sister. He wanted to know if you'd seen her."

Karma's hand jerks to a stop in the middle of brushing her hair, and she swears the bracelet in her pocket is burning against her leg. Taking deep breaths, she resumes brushing her hair. Heathcliff waits patiently. Finally, she puts the brush away and sits down on the bed next to him to start braiding her hair mechanically.

"I did run into her," she starts, her tone decidedly neutral. "We teamed up. She found the end boss room and the exit. When we went to fight it, she tried to make a break for the door by herself, but it wouldn't open. The boss killed her. I took the door out by myself."

Heathcliff is silent for a few moments as she finishes doing her hair. "Do you want me to tell him?"

"No," she says sharply, tying off the last braid and standing up. "I'll do it."

When she quietly asks the young man to step outside, she thinks he already knows what she's going to tell him. She rehearsed this a million times already—during her climb up the staircase past the gold-inlaid door, trekking over the sand dunes towards the town, in her muzzy waking moments between her napping, on her way downstairs to meet him.

The least she can do, she figures, is look him in the eye as she pulls the bracelet out of her pocket and holds it out and says, "Your sister died saving my life. I'm sorry for your loss."

He yells at her. Shouts and cries and weeps. Rails on about how unfair it is, why Karma lived while Rune died. Screams and sobs. Karma stands there and takes it all silently. He throws a wild, enraged punch, and she lets it roll off of a weak block with her free arm. She stumbles back, but doesn't say a word and simply keeps the bracelet in her outstretched palm.

Heathcliff must've been watching, because he steps in then. The young man stands there, shoulders trembling, tears streaming down his face, and now Karma can't bring herself to make eye contact. She keeps standing there with the bracelet, like a robot. Eventually, he takes it, trembling hands surprisingly gentle despite how they acted so violently earlier, and leaves.

"Why did you lie?"

Karma takes a deep, deep breath and lets it out. "He didn't do anything wrong. And neither did Rune. I didn't want to leave him with that image of her in his mind." She closes her eyes, remembering the weak whisper of a 'thank you' that the young man gave before walking away, head bowed. "And sometimes, it's just easier to move on if you have someone to blame."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please let me know what you think! :)


	3. Chapter 3

_** Shhh: 3/25/2023 ** _

Karma lets her gaze roam over the terrain, then makes a hand motion to the rest of her group. Slowly, they slink forwards like patches of shadow, detaching themselves from the pine tree line and moving quietly but quickly across the exposed field of rocks. It’s the only way to get to where they’re going, and it’s risky, but less so than climbing down that cliff face would’ve been. With all the raptors circling in the air, outnumbering them five to one, they would’ve been sitting ducks. No, this was the only viable option.

At least, that’s what she keeps telling herself.

They’d gotten separated from the rest of the group while crossing the river, trying to avoid making sound to draw the raptors’ keen hearing. When roughly three quarters of the group was across, one of the floor’s other monsters came crashing through the trees on the close side, where Karma and her part of the team still was, forcing them to withdraw and abandon the only point where they could cross the wild river.

At least Asuna should be safe with the other group. That’s the only consolation Karma has. The rest of the trip after the river should’ve been easy terrain to cover. Their numbers were split by the partial failure of the river crossing, but the other group has enough people (unlike Karma and her group of six, including herself), and with Heathcliff at the head of the group, they should be fine.

Karma’s group was forced to take a huge detour into the mountains, on the other hand. They should be in the final leg of their trip now, but the last quarter of the distance is taking them as long as the previous three quarters did.

She can only hope the others waited for them. They should’ve, because although sending messages is impossible in dungeons, they’ve all friended each other. Karma’s group’s names won’t have faded out, so they others know they’re still alive.

_Clink._

Everyone whips around, eyes wide. Kili is frozen in an awkward position, half-crouched. His knife lies on the rocks a meter to the side, as if he tripped and lost his grip in an attempt to catch himself before falling. By some sheer stroke of luck, it landed in a small clump of dry grass, minimizing the sound it made.

He slowly tries to reach for it, but Karma makes a frantic ‘no’ motion with her hand, and he freezes again. She motions for him to keep moving towards her and the others.

When the last person scurries to crouch behind the large boulder they picked before as a checkpoint, they all breathe a sigh of relief--mentally, at least. Karma hands Kili the spare dagger in her inventory, waving aside his charade-like apology, and allows them a brief moment of reprieve before motioning for them to go on. They still have a lot of ground to cover.

She and Crane, an older, grizzly-haired, lanky man with the air of a veteran, scout ahead, moving into the next stretch of forest. Once they’re inside the forest and enveloped in its natural sounds, they feel some of the pressure ease, but don’t let up at all in their careful movements--lucky for them. There are countless numbers of pitfalls to watch out for, from tangled roots to rocks lodged in the soil to low-hanging branches. And in the uncertain lighting of pre-dawn, they almost stumble right into a sinkhole.

When she hears gurgling water, she breathes a quiet sigh of relief. They’re heading the right way. Just across this rope bridge should be a final stretch of uphill running before they reach the swamps that the others are at.

Her relief is very short-lived.

The two players stare in shock at the rope bridge, which has been slashed through the middle, and they exchange horrified looks. Slowly, Karma slinks into the open, and her heart plummets as she sees the state of the bridge. It’s completely unsalvageable. How did this happen? Aren’t natural objects and landmarks supposed to be immortal objects?

She barely refrains from jumping when Crane appears next to her. He points at the sheer rock wall about twenty meters upriver.

“If we can make our way down there,” he whispers, practically mouthing the words in her ear, “we might be able to edge our way across and jump to the other side, right at that point.”

She chews her lip hard enough to make it bleed, but of course it doesn’t actually. “That’s a big ‘might’.”

“Do we have another choice?”

With a silent sigh, she concedes the point, and they go to check out their only option. And there is a ledge. A very narrow ledge, a meter above a very fast river.

She stands guard while Crane shimmies his way across the ledge. From her point of view, she can’t see him when he vanishes around the curve, and her fists clench.

After what seems like forever, she suddenly sees a human-shaped silhouette pop up from the tall grass on the other side of the river, and Crane waves triumphantly. She almost collapses in relief, and he makes a ‘one minute’ motion and disappears again.

She keeps track of the time this time, and ten minutes later, he makes his way back to her side of the river. “It’s not hard to do,” he says quietly. “That part right there, where you have to reach around the corner, that’s the hardest part. There’s a vertical crack in the stone for a foothold, and a small ledge you can use as a handhold. From there, you can get back on the ledge, but it’s slippery, so go slowly.”

He walks her through the rest of the process, and she nods, doing her best to visualize it. “Okay. Take me across.”

He shakes his head. “The others are probably wondering what’s taking so long. If they try coming through by themselves, they might fall into that sinkhole. I’ll go across by myself and wait for you guys. You bring them over, and I’ll watch your backs while you cross.”

“Alright. You should get to the swamps and alert the others.”

“There’s no time. Once the sun rises, the raptors can see well enough to attack on sight.” They both look at the horizon, where a faint glow is already brightening in strength. Never has a sunrise seemed so foreboding.

Karma wracks her mind for a way to better their chances, but comes up with none. Reluctantly, she agrees.

She makes her way back to the others, explains the bridge situation, and leads them through the forest, taking a wide berth around the sinkhole. Her nerves thrum and buzz the whole time with anxiety over their current task at hand, which is making their way through this tangled forest without incident, their next task, which is making their way across a very narrow ledge without incident, and the possibility of messing up on either.

More than one player balks at the broken bridge and the precarious crossing, but she explains the passing briskly, not giving them time to worry. The trip is just as nerve-wracking for her as it is for the others, since she never made the trip herself, although she does not tell them that. More than once, her feet scrabble frantically for a split second or two before settling on a secure hold, leaving her heart pounding and programmed sweat making her palms clammy.

Crane has circled around to wait for them at the crossing point. Karma takes another deep breath, her millionth one tonight, and makes the second-to-last long jump, hands flying out to catch herself on the wall. Her feet almost slip on a patch of moss on the slick rock, but she catches herself in time. Trying to appear confident, she waves at the others and moves back to a wider rock outcropping so they have room.

Kili goes first, and she hauls him up onto the rock with an encouraging smile she doesn’t feel. He’s shaking like a leaf, but seems to relax a bit when she squeezes his shoulder. She directs him to finish the path, which is pretty straightforward compared to the rest.

_SPLASH!_

She whips around in time to see two other players haul another out of the water, but it’s too late.

_SCREEEEEE!_

Her blood freezes at the cry, and as one, the six of them look up as the raptors converge on their position like a cloud of locusts, except much bigger, and a lot more vicious. Karma assesses the situation in a second, and it’s not good.

The other three are still only three quarters of the way down the ledge. Kili hasn’t made the last jump yet and seems frozen in terror. They’re all sitting ducks.

Her gaze flickers to Crane, who is on the other side. His gaze meets hers, and his eyes widen when he realizes what she’s thinking.

Hating herself so much, she nods silently once as the raptors descend. Resolve hardens in his sky blue gaze when she gives the order.

With a quick, casual salute, he turns and starts running and hollering at the top of his lungs--away from the rest of their group, and away from where the rest of the party is waiting.

“Over here, you useless lizards!” he hollers, making as much noise as humanly possible. “Come on, come and get me!”

Nautilus inhales, horrified, but Fultz claps a hand over his mouth just in time. Karma lets herself watch Crane go for a second before she tells herself that she can’t afford to linger while he buys them time. She gives Kili a light shove.

“Go, go, go!” she hisses, then whirls around to beckon frantically to the others.

The raptors arrow after Crane, who is making enough noise for all six of them. All attempts at stealth gone, Kili dives across, hitting the ground in a spray of pebbles, and she flaps her arms at him to start running to the swamps, which he does. In rapid succession, the last three cross. Nautilus, who’s still soaking wet from the waist down, is white as a sheet.

She cuts him off as he opens his mouth. “No time, just go!”

Once his feet hit the dirt, she takes a running start and sails across the remaining gap easily. She hauls him to his feet when he stumbles and practically drags him for a few meters before he gets his bearings, and they sprint up the hill in a mad dash for safety.

Karma tries to ignore the fact that she can’t hear Crane’s shouting anymore.

\---

“It’s them!”

Asuna’s on her feet before she knows it, grabbing her rapier and dashing out of the cave ahead of everyone else. “Where?!”

Kili, wild-eyed and terrified, barrels past her in the opposite direction to the safety of the caves, where the raptors can’t go. Following him are the others--Muldar, Nautilus, Fultz. Asuna has a heart-stopping moment of pure fear when she doesn’t see twin braids.

But then a silhouette appears over the hill, blade flashing. Raptors have descended on Karma already, and she’s furiously trying to push them back. One of them slashes their claws across her chest with a screech, and she tumbles down the hill with a cry, red polygons flaking from the slash marks. They dive after her, and she just barely manages to roll out of the way and scramble to her feet.

Asuna doesn’t hesitate to dive in as Karma is nearly knocked to the ground again. Executing a simple Linear attack, she buries her rapier in the raptor’s neck, and it bursts into pixels. Heathcliff is running in too; he blocks the next few attacks with his shield as Asuna grabs Karma and pulls her bodily to her feet.

Stubbornly, Karma whirls back around to help their leader, cutting down another two raptors before the three of them turn and run for the caves during a brief lull. Out of control from their downhill momentum, the two girls crash to the ground in a clatter of light armor once inside the cool, dark safety of the tunnels.

Asuna grunts as Karma yanks her into a bone-crushing hug, trembling, but the brunette doesn’t hesitate to return the gesture. There’s no need for silence now, and yet neither of them seem to be able to find the right words.

At the sound of quiet footfalls approaching, Karma looks up, still holding Asuna close, to see Heathcliff.

“We lost Crane,” she whispers before he asks, tasting bile in her throat for a moment when she thinks of his death--ordered by her. His life, ended by her command.

Heavy silence sweeps over the players, a moment to mourn their fallen comrade. Heathcliff simply nods, his gray eyes unreadable, and kneels down by them. He hands her a health potion and asks, “Are you okay?”

She nods, voice gone, and uncorks the potion with shaking hands.

“Good. Let’s rest, and then we’ll press on to the town. You did very well, all of you.”

But for the first time since meeting him, she can’t quite seem to believe his words.

\---

It took the better part of the day, but they’ve made it to the next town. Before leaving the caves, she learns that the other group lost a player to the beasts that surprised them at the first river crossing, when the group was split up. All in all, given that this stretch was so difficult, their losses were mercifully low. And now that they’re in the town’s inn, preparing for a night of sleep in a safe zone for the first time in days, they should feel safe.

Karma feels like a failure.

“Karma?”

She glances up at the sound of her roommate’s worried voice. “What’s up, Asuna?”

Asuna sits down on the edge of Karma’s bed, copper gaze filled with concern. “You’ve been really quiet today. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’ll be okay,” she tries to reassure the younger girl, but even she can’t believe her own words. “Those last few days were just...really brutal.”

“You were amazing, though,” Asuna tells her, grasping her hand with a smile. “There were so many raptors, and yet you got six people down a mountain, through a canyon, and over a river with no bridge.”

But only five lived. Five, not six.

Karma musters a wan smile. “Thanks, Asuna. A-actually, I have to talk to Heathcliff about something.”

When she goes to his room, though, he’s not there. She ventures downstairs, only to find him talking with Godfree and Uzala at one of the tables. Heathcliff looks wide awake; the other two look like they’re about to fall asleep face-first in their drinks any second.

Trying to muster some light-heartedness, she deadpans, “Why are you still awake?”

Godfree nearly knocks over his mug with a start. “Eh? Oh, yes, excellent idea! Er...what were we talking about?”

Uzala yawns, reaches for his mug, misses by about ten centimeters, and stares in confusion before blearily grabbing his mug and draining what’s left of it.

Heathcliff sighs, the candlelight casting his sharp features in stark shadow. “Perhaps some sleep is in order.”

They don’t need to be told twice, and stumble past her, up the stairs to the rooms.

“Something on your mind?”

Karma turns, blinking, to meet Heathcliff’s calm gaze, and she nods, swallowing hard. “Kind of.”

“Well, I don’t feel like sleeping yet.” He makes a gesture towards the door. “Would you like to take a walk?”

“...Okay.”

As they walk, she knows Heathcliff is observing all the buildings they pass, noting the supply shops, restaurants, weapon smiths, etc. And she should be too, but she honestly just can’t be bothered to care right now. She just follows him down the streets, sort of in an exhausted daze.

They reach a square of some sorts, with a fountain burbling in the center. Karma sits down on the stone bricks on the edge and tucks her knees up to her chest. To her surprise, Heathcliff sits down next to her, though at a polite distance, and waits for her to talk.

At last, she takes a deep breath. “I can’t stop thinking about Crane,” she whispers. In the quiet night, it sounds like a fuse hissing. “I feel like I killed him.”

“That’s not true,” he says firmly, though with no judgement, and she bites her lip, leaning her forehead against her knees as tears well in her eyes.

“I ordered him to die,” she chokes out, disgust and shame and anguish roiling in her stomach. “To save the rest of us, I told him to die.”

For a long while, he doesn’t respond. Then: “I talked to the other players you were with.”

She lifts her gaze a bit, still sniffling, as he continues, “Both of you knew what had to be done. But it was only once you gave the order that Crane carried it out unflinchingly.”

The words hit her like bullets, but he keeps talking calmly.

“You gave him the resolve to do what was necessary. Crane, and all of the players you kept alive under your command, placed their faith in you, because when trapped between a hammer and anvil, you were able to make the difficult choice to save as many as you could. He understood that--and knew that you wouldn’t have hesitated to sacrifice yourself in his place if you could’ve.”

She looks up with a sharp inhale when Heathcliff places a surprisingly gentle hand on her shoulder. “You’re a good leader, Karma. And a good leader has to make a lot of difficult decisions. Under strenuous conditions, against crippling odds, you did the best you could, and you did well. And sometimes, your best won’t be enough to save everyone. But it’ll be enough, and sometimes, you’ll just have to accept that.”

His faith in her, her comrades’ faith in her, it’s all overwhelming, but she can’t help but feel uplifted by it all, and more tears well in her eyes, to her embarrassment. “I--s-sorry, it’s just-”

“It’s okay. It’s been a long few days.” He lets out a soft sigh. “And there’ll be more times when you can’t afford to show fear in front of the ones you lead. But this isn’t one of them.”

Having essentially been given the go-ahead, Karma promptly puts her face down on her leader’s shoulder and sobs.

\---

Karma and Asuna are in their room making sure they’ve got everything when there’s a knock on the door, and Karma pulls it open. “Heathcliff?”

He nods to her and Asuna in greeting. “Might I have a word with you two?”

They exchange a mildly confused look, and Asuna says, “Um, sure. Come in.”

He enters, but doesn’t sit down, and says without preamble, “Karma, Asuna-kun, when we create the guild, I’d like you two to be at the head of it with me.”

Karma can’t stop her mouth from falling open at that. Asuna looks just as floored as she does. “...What?” Karma finally says, very intelligently.

“You both have proven yourselves confident and capable of leading others in stressful situations,” he explains calmly. “We can talk about ranks and specific roles later, but I want you two as leaders.”

Karma turns to look at Asuna, both of them wide-eyed. The younger girl takes a deep breath and turns to face Heathcliff.

“You can count on me,” she declares, copper eyes gleaming. He nods, and they both look at Karma.

Her fists clench by her sides. She thinks of that horrible moment when she sacrificed her comrade to save the rest of them. She thinks of how she never wants to do that ever again.

She thinks of the conversation last night. She thinks of Muldar, Nautilus, Fultz, Kili. Crane. Asuna. And her leader, who’s always had faith in her, sometimes more than herself.

“If you believe in me,” she says at last, meeting Heathcliff’s steady gray gaze, “I’ll follow you anywhere.” With a smirk, she adds almost teasingly, _“Danchou.”_

She glances at Asuna, and they both snap off a formal salute, although their poorly suppressed grins kind of ruin it. She doesn’t yet know what those words she just said are going to mean to her.

Heathcliff gives them a brief flicker of an eyeroll, probably thinking something along the lines of, _Kids these days_. “Maybe in the future. Finish packing, and we’ll meet downstairs in five.” He leaves then.

“What did you guys talk about anyways?” Asuna asks casually as they do just that. Her tone is curious, but deliberately light.

Karma waves away her items menu. “I was just getting some stuff off my chest, and he gave me some advice.”

“About what?”

She shrugs, deciding not to mention her meltdown. “About being a leader, and stuff. He said--he said that…” She draws in a deep breath. “That leaders will always have to make difficult decisions. And sometimes their best won’t be enough to be perfect.”

A touch on her arm surprises her, and she turns to look at Asuna as the brunette smiles. “I’m glad you got to have that talk. You fought hard yesterday, but you seemed really worn out.”

Her heart warms at Asuna’s obvious concern, and she hugs the younger girl. “I’m sorry if I worried you.”

Asuna shakes her head. “It’s not your fault. Just…” She pulls back with a small smile. “You can talk to me too, if you want. I might not be a fountain of wisdom, but I’ll listen anytime.”

Karma swallows hard, and lifts a hand to pat Asuna’s head with a smile. It’s only been a few weeks since they met, but the girl is like the little sister she never had.

“Thanks, Asuna. I’ll definitely keep that in mind.” She knows she’ll never take her up on that offer if she can help it, but the gesture is heart-warming.

They arrive downstairs in a few minutes. Most of the guys are grumbling about the early hour, as usual, which brings a smile to Karma’s face. Once everyone’s assembled, they step out into the early dawn, and Karma takes a deep breath of the fresh morning air. It tastes cool and crisp and revitalizing, like dew and sunshine, and tingles in her lungs. Amidst all the Floor maps and boss AIs and towns and items, Kayaba Akihiko still found the time to make his world feel so real.

So this is her life now.

She finds she’s okay with it.

And there’ll be some days when she’s not.

But she’ll take those days as they come, with her comrades by her side.

\---

_** Sleep: 4/2/2023 ** _

A pair of half-lidded eyes blinks slowly at the line of light coming from under the door. Karma stares at it for a moment, then reaches for the doorknob.

Heathcliff looks up from his work in surprise when Karma sticks her head in and says, “Did you know it’s past midnight?”

“...Yes, it is,” he says, slightly confused. “Why are you still awake?”

“Funny,” Karma deadpans, “that was my question, _danchou.”_

He narrows his eyes slightly. “If you must know, I have work to do.”

“You also have sleep to catch and players to lead tomorrow, but I don’t see you thinking about either of those.”

“I could say the same to you,” he replies archly, and she just shrugs.

“Couldn’t fall asleep,” she admits. “But at least I was trying.” She steps inside with a sheepish smile. “D’you mind if I keep you company?”

“As long as you’re quiet.”

She curls up in the chair on the other side of his desk, cat-like, and rests her head on her folded arms atop the desk, eyes sliding shut. The only sounds she hears are those of papers rustling every so often.

After a while, she opens one eye with a soft sigh, still half-awake. The vague blur of red solidifies into her commander after a second, now studying a map of the floor with a look of utmost concentration. A soft glow of affection fills her chest, and she yawns and finally drifts off to sleep.

Somehow, the next morning, she wakes up in her own bed, and she stares up at the ceiling in muzzy confusion. Was that just a dream last night? It seems like a very ordinary thing to just dream about.

With a yawn, she rolls out of bed, glancing over at Asuna, who’s still fast asleep. Upon entering the bathroom, she grabs her hair brush and vigorously starts untangling all the knots. After splashing her face with some cold water, she wrangles her hair into its twin braids and goes to get some breakfast. One perk about the virtual world is that morning breath isn’t a thing, and neither is teeth-brushing.

She pauses when she sees a sliver of light under a certain door, and feels a distinct sense of deja vu. After staring at it for a moment, she shakes her head and heads downstairs. A few minutes later, she returns upstairs and pushes open the door.

“Did you even sleep last night?” she demands indignantly, giving Heathcliff a stern look.

He looks up at her in mild irritation. “Could you please knock next time?”

“Could you please go to sleep at a reasonable hour next time?” she snipes back, setting one cup of coffee down on his desk and taking a sip from the other one in her hand. “We’ve only been a guild for a week. We don’t need our leader burning out on us already.”

“I slept.”

She gives him a look. “Oh, _did_ you.”

He rolls his eyes at her and takes the coffee mug she put on his desk. “I did.” He lifts the coffee mug, then hesitates and stares suspiciously at her. “You didn’t put salt in this, did you?”

Karma gasps theatrically at him. “I am _offended_ that you would think so lowly of me. And besides, yesterday was April Fool’s. Not my fault you didn’t realize.”

Heathcliff lets out an irritated huff and takes a sip of coffee. “Thank you for the coffee, then.”

Her brow furrows, and she places a hand on her hip. “I’m serious. I watched Megu try to live off of caffeine and blood and tears during high school entrance exams; luckily, when she crashed and burned, it was on the mock exam. You wanna know what I did?” She doesn’t give him a chance to guess. “I took away her coffee until the exams.”

“Your point?”

“That I don’t want you to crash and burn when you can’t afford to,” she says, sobering a bit. “I know there are probably things only a guild leader can do, but as for the rest? That’s why you have a guild. So we can help you.” She takes a sip of coffee. “So, I’m done preaching, but if you wanna explain to Uzala why we ran out of coffee so fast, I ain’t getting nowhere near that.”

With a cheerful smile, she skips out of the room.

\---

_** Shopping: 4/5/2023 ** _

Karma glances up, eyebrows scrunched, not quite sure if she heard right. “What?”

“We’re going shopping!” Asuna says cheerfully, beaming. “If we’re gonna be a top-tier clearing guild, we gotta look the part.”

“Um.” She stares. “Why?”

“Duh! To make it clear we’re serious, and stuff.” Asuna grabs Karma by the arm. “Now come on! It’s about time you got that plain brown cloak replaced.”

“But I don’t need-”

“Nope! Even Heathcliff’s coming with us. He was the one who suggested the idea of uniforms,” Asuna informs her brightly as she drags Karma down the stairs, and Karma sighs. So it was their leader’s idea.

The guys are waiting outside the inn, all looking more excited to be shopping than Karma (except Heathcliff; he looks kind of bored), and Karma squints as the sunlight hits.

“So why are we going shopping?” she asks, bewildered. “Do we need new armor? Do we even have enough money for it?”

“I got a very depressed ‘yes’ out of Daizen earlier,” Asuna says, way too happily.

“As for why, we look like a rainbow,” Uzala explains wryly. “Gotta have guild unity, y’know?”

“Um, you’re the one with blue hair,” Kili reminds him smartly.

Karma looks around. They do sort of ‘look like a rainbow’, in Uzala’s words, but still, they’re a very tough rainbow. “...So what’s the plan?”

“Red and white,” Godfree declares with admirable enthusiasm, considering it’s just a shopping trip they’re going on. “I was thinking of capes, and we should get an emblem, too…”

They start off down the street, and she sighs as he rambles on. “I was wondering where we were going, but okay…So as long as we follow the color scheme, we can wear whatever?”

“That’s the idea,” Heathcliff agrees, glancing back at her. “You don’t seem too excited.”

“I just don’t think it’s necessary, and I especially don’t like clothes shopping, but-” She holds up her hands in a surrender gesture. “-I’m outvoted, so.”

“Don’t worry, you’ll look good in red,” Asuna reassures her with a bounce in her step. “And white doesn’t clash with anything.”

“...Not what I was thinking about, but okay.”

“Why don’t you like shopping?” Kili asks in amusement, hands tucked behind his head. “I thought all teenage girls-”

“Don’t even go there, buddy,” she deadpans, but with a dry smile to let him know she’s just joking. “I just don’t like going clothes shopping, because my real life best friend insists on burying me up to my armpits in clothes for me to try on whenever we do.”

“Oh, good, you’re familiar with the process,” says Asuna, who has a wicked gleam in her eye.

Karma gulps as Asuna resumes happily walking along, and she breathes out a resigned sigh. No matter which world she’s in, she seems to have gotten herself a fashion-obsessed sister-best-friend.

\---

“How about this?”

“No.”

“This one?”

“No.”

“This one looks nice-”

“No. I’m not wearing a skirt, Asuna.”

“But-”

“Nope. Absolutely not. Have you seen how much I move around? I don’t fancy flashing anyone accidentally,” Karma says with a snort. “I don’t know how you do it.”

Asuna sighs dramatically, eliciting a laugh from Kili that turns into a yelp when she chucks a shoe at him, and he ducks behind a rack of cloaks.

Karma looks thoughtfully at the cloaks and wanders over, looking through them. “Oh, I really like this,” she remarks appreciatively, pausing on a rich crimson one that would probably fall to her hips--not too long, but still long enough to wrap around her upper body. It boosts her stats a bit too.

“Ooh, that’s a nice color,” Asuna says with a poorly masked tone of relief that Karma actually picked something. “Not too bright, not too murky. You should get that.”

She grins at Asuna, half-amused by her enthusiastic insistence, and picks up the cloak off the rack. “Okay, I will.”

The brunette claps her hands together victoriously. “Yay! So about that skirt-”

“No.”

\---

_** BAMF: 4/8/2023 ** _

“Now that we’re all situated in our new headquarters,” Heathcliff starts from his position at the end of the kitchen table, “let’s talk about the guild structure and positions. I’ve made my choices after receiving input from all of you.

“There will be two groups--the first and second army. The first army will comprise our strongest players who will participate in boss battles. The second will be the rest, who will be training should we need to pull reinforcements to the first army. The first army will be split into three teams, A, B, and C, to make battle commands easier. I’ve chosen Godfree to lead team A.”

The axe-wielder, already a popular face amongst the guild with his cheerful disposition, grins and waves, and the others nod with murmurs of satisfied agreement.

“-and Karma and Asuna-kun will co-lead team B. When the guild expands, Uzala will lead team C. For now, he’ll be in charge of the second army.”

Karma grins crookedly at Asuna, who returns the expression. Both have lots of faith in each other, and a little less in themselves, and not much experience by way of age, unlike Godfree and Uzala. Working together lifts some of that pressure off their individual teenage shoulders. She’s relieved to see that Uzala doesn’t seem at all displeased that he’s on the waiting list; he just whistles loudly with a grin. Some of the old-timers give them encouraging thumbs-ups and a few claps. Most of the rest of the guild seems satisfied, or at least amiable to the decision.

Most, at least.

“Wait, wait,” one of the newer players interrupts, frowning at the two girls, “are we really just putting our lives in their hands? Surely there are people here more qualified than two teenage girls?”

Everyone turns to look at him, and Asuna deadpans, “Are you asking to get your ass kicked by said teenage girls?”

There’s an explosion of sound over by Uzala, who’s coughing very dramatically into his elbow.

“Sorry, sorry,” he wheezes, “got something, ah, stuck in my throat…”

Godfree’s shoulders are also shaking very suspiciously. Kili is drinking water like a dying person. Muldar and Fultz are barely suppressing smirks. Even Heathcliff, whose expression remains stoic and indifferent, has a wry glint in his eyes.

Karma rolls her eyes, more at her friends’ antics than anything else. “I’ll handle this. You did save my butt back there in the boss fight.”

Asuna grabs her cup of tea and sips daintily. “Much appreciated.”

Uzala shakes the cookie tin at her. “Want some cookies for the show?”

“...I just made those. Where did you get those.”

“…Would ‘I’d rather not say’ be an acceptable answer?”

“No.”

Karma gets up from her seat and beckons for the other player to do the same, smiling. Not wanting to back down from his challenge, he gets up, scowling down at her.

“I like your hat,” she says, gesturing up at the frankly silly-looking conical helmet (but hey, she’s not one to judge on fashion choice). “Where’d you get it?”

His scowl deepens, but at her question and gesture, his eyes flicker up involuntarily.

She takes a step forward, grabs the helmet, and slams it down bluntly. Pain doesn’t register in this game, but the impact does, and he stumbles with a grunt of surprise. While he’s distracted, she easily trips him with a twist of her foot; in less than a second, he’s staring up at the ceiling with a distinct lack of air in his artificial lungs, wondering how he got there, with Karma standing above him, sword half-drawn.

“A split second,” she says quietly, her smile gone and her tone serious now, “is all it takes. When we’re in the heat of a fight, sometimes you won’t see things until it’s too late. That split second can cost a life. It could be yours, and you’d better hope to whatever god you believe in that it’s not someone else’s.” She pushes her sword back in its sheath. “Are we good?”

He manages a nod, wide-eyed, and she extends her left hand to help him up, her wide smile returning all of a sudden. “Excellent. You joined yesterday, right? My name’s Karma, and that terrifying girl threatening Uzala with the rapier over there is Asuna. Don’t worry about being potentially skewered in a fit of rage; Uzala has plenty of advice for pissing her off, so just do the opposite of everything he tells you in that regard, and your avatar should remain puncture wound free. I’m looking forward to working together!”

\---

_** Rise of KoB: 4/12/2023 ** _

“Wait, what?”

“It’ll make a greater impact for them to see Karma and Asuna-kun up there speaking,” their commander says calmly, and the lone girls of the guild exchange unsure looks.

“But why?” Asuna asks in bewilderment. “You’re the leader.”

“He’s right!” Godfree chimes in, beaming. “Everyone’s unsure after the last boss fight. It’ll do a lot of good for morale to see the two of you up there, taking charge!”

“Yeah, who can resist a couple of cute girls telling them what to do?” Uzala says with a wink, and Karma promptly punches him in the face in a burst of light. “Ow…”

“Are you serious?” she demands in exasperation. They’re still in the safe zone of the town, so it’s not like she did any damage. The others make no attempt to help him up. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Right?” She glances at Heathcliff. To her horror, he just raises his eyebrows. “...You’re joking.”

He just shrugs one armored shoulder. “The two of you are some of the only female players on the front lines, and the youngest. You’ll make a bigger impact than I would.”

Karma facepalms, and Asuna buries her red face in her hands. “You’re joking,” the brunette groans loudly.

“I’m not joking.”

“Oh, I know,” Karma mutters under her breath, levelling an annoyed stare at her commander. “I don’t like you. I’m not making you coffee anymore.”

All heads turn as the newly formed Knights of the Blood Oath come marching into the room, new customized armor shining. Karma can feel her face going red at the weight of so many stares. Asuna looks a bit uncomfortable too, to Karma’s relief, although the commander just looks as calm as ever.

The two girls look up at him one last time, and he just tilts his head expectantly.

Karma takes a deep breath and sticks out her elbow to Asuna, smirking. “Ready to go?”

Asuna also takes a deep breath and loops her arm through Karma’s, grinning nervously. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Good enough.”

\---

“See, what did I tell you?”

“...I'm still not making you coffee anymore.”

\---

“I thought you said you weren't making me coffee anymore.”

“That? That's just decaf. I got the real stuff right here.”

“...Why does this game have decaf?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if I got some things wrong about the guild structure...I based most of it off of what was explained in Hopeful Chant, and kind of made some things up too.
> 
> I was inspired by Ranger's Apprentice for the helmet scene :) Anyone know what I'm talking about...?
> 
> Thank you for reading! Please leave a review and let me know what you think! :)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Went and added titles to each 'segment' for clarity (I don't know why I didn't do it from the start. I had all the titles already)
> 
> These few are from early in the game--just some team bonding and stuff. In other words, Heathcliff is that one responsible friend who is Just Done (me in real life) and the others aren't having it (my friends in real life).

_** Late Night Chat: 11/13/2022, Floor 1 (fields) ** _

Karma rolls over with a quiet sigh, staring up at the velvety night sky through the tangle of tree branches. Her restlessness might have something to do with the scratchy bedroll, or the hard dirt beneath, or the lumpy pillow and the resulting crick in her neck, or the danger of the fields, or her companions’ earthquake snoring, but she’s not sure it’s really any of those.

She stiffens when Heathcliff, who’s on watch, shifts slightly next to her. “Can’t sleep?”

“Sorry,” she whispers guiltily, rolling onto her side.

He sighs. In the moonlight, his eyes shine silver. “It’s fine. Do you want to talk?”

No, not really, but she’ll probably keep them both awake regardless of whether or not she’s talking.

“What about?” she mumbles.

“Anything.”

She sighs. He doesn’t know about _that,_ and she doesn’t want to say. She casts around for some other topic.

“Can I tell you about my real life?” she finally asks.

He blinks, seemingly surprised, but nods. “Of course.”

Karma takes a deep breath. “I was born and raised in Miyazaki prefecture. My family’s middle-class, pretty average...My dad’s a teacher. My mom is a nurse.” She wonders if her mom is watching over her real life body right now at the hospital. “I wanted siblings, but my parents never caved. We compromised--we have a cat named Botamochi. He’s a fat tuxedo cat, and he doesn’t do anything but sunbathe and eat and sleep, but if he thinks you don’t love him anymore, he’ll squash you by sitting on your lap until you pet him.”

Once she starts talking, she can’t stop. It seems like no one really wants to talk about their real lives in here, which she doesn’t understand. It’s what they’re all fighting for, right? To get back to their real lives?

“I’ve known my best friend since grade school. Her name’s Ebisu Megu, and she lives in the apartment block across the street from mine. She’s the same age as me, but she skipped a grade. We walk to school together every day.” Who does she walk with now? “She’s super smart. She could probably be an engineer or a doctor or something, but she wants to be a teacher, which I think is cool. She tutors all the time...I don’t know how she does it. I could never put up with all those kids every day. I’m not really a people person…” She’s always had Megu, though, so it never really mattered.

“She was always the straight-A kid, but I think I was the more athletic one. I always liked dancing, but I never took classes or anything...I did use to do swimming, ice skating, and gymnastics--now that I think about it, they probably helped with dancing--but then I got to high school...I only went to the pool every other week or so since high school started.” A smile twitches at her lips. “Megu’s scared of the water. It took me ten minutes to convince her to even splash around in the shallow pool with the kiddie playset.”

As she talks, her eyelids grow heavy. It helps her forget how her heart does the same. Eventually, she doesn’t realize it, but she’s just mumbling, eyes almost fully closed. She can’t fathom why Heathcliff looks vaguely amused as he reaches over to pull the covers of her bedroll a little more securely around her, and that’s the last thing she remembers before she finally falls asleep.

\---

_** Friends: 11/15/2022, Floor 1 (town) ** _

Karma gives a slight start when Godfree pops up in front of her, grinning. “Here.”

Blinking rapidly in surprise, she looks down to see him holding out a cup of hot chocolate to her. She musters a small smile as she accepts it and takes a grateful sip.

“It’s good,” she says in surprise, and takes another sip.

“Isn’t it?” He plops down next to her on the bench with his own cup and a contented sigh.

“Thank you,” she murmurs, breathing in the sweet chocolatey aroma and letting it warm her up from the inside.

“Sure thing.” He smiles widely. He seems to do that a lot. “Perfect pick-me-up on a day like this, huh?”

Karma glances up at the dreary gray cloud cover. Fall in Aincrad is starting to move towards winter, so she didn’t realize how much she appreciates the gesture until her hands start to warm up. “Yeah, it is.”

She watches him out of the corner of her eye. She hasn’t found much energy to interact with him or Uzala, both of whom are extraverted, upbeat people, but they seem to be content with just interacting with her.

“Where are the others? Aren’t they with you?”

He shades his eyes with a hand, peering into the throngs of people bustling around the market stalls. “Hmm. No idea. They said they’d meet us here, though, so might as well wait.”

“Mmm.” A smile curls at her lips at his jovial demeanor. It’s a welcome change from the seriousness of most other players right about now. At the inns they stay at, people talk quietly, heads close together, eyes darting back and forth. There’s a pervading sense of dread and trepidation, even amongst those who are brave enough to venture into the fields, and people are scared to trust one another. Godfree’s booming laugh never fails to brighten up the atmosphere, though, no matter how many silently annoyed looks they get from other players.

“You remind me a little of my daughter, y’know?”

She glances up at Godfree, who’s staring into his hot chocolate with a pensive smile. “At first glance, she’s the sweetest, most docile kid on the playground. Wouldn’t hurt a fly. But if you talk over her head, she’ll give you the cold shoulder for as long as possible, and then some. I’d know.” He turns to her, smile widening slightly. “I have a feeling you’re hiding some of your own inner strength.”

Karma wants to say, ‘You’ll make it back to see your daughter.’ But she knows it’s a promise she can’t hope to keep--not as weak as she is now, anyway. Still, she brings herself to place a hand on his shoulder wordlessly, although the silence doesn’t feel half as heavy as it usually might.

\---

“...How did you and Godfree and Heathcliff all form a party?”

She and Uzala are waiting in the inn, sitting at one of the oaken tables with drinks while they’re waiting for the others. They decided to split into pairs to go hunting today, although Karma usually goes with Heathcliff if that’s the case.

_“Are you getting tired of me so soon?” she asked Heathcliff when he told them, playing up her pitiful sulking, to the other guys’ amusement._

_Heathcliff just rolled his eyes and shooed her towards Uzala, who held out an arm like a knight out of a fairy tale. “Shall we, my lady?”_

_Karma couldn’t help but smile, and she bumped her elbow against his playfully. He yelped at that, rubbing his elbow as he exclaimed that she’d hit his funny bone, to her further amusement._

Uzala glances over at her question. “Eh? Oh, well, it’s rather easy, you see. You open your menu, and select-”

Karma scowls playfully at that, elbowing him hard enough to wipe the smirk off his face. “You know what I meant.”

“Ow, ow, okay, okay, no need to get violent,” he whines, massaging the spot where she elbowed him with an exaggerated expression of hurt. “We all met up during the first few hours of the game, actually. I got lost in the Town of Beginnings--that place is like a maze.” Karma can sympathize. “Great minds think alike, though! Godfree was lost too.” He chuckles sheepishly, making her smile.

“So we both wandered around being lost together, no matter how many NPCs we asked for directions to the fields...I swear half of them are programmed to give us false info,” he adds with a conspiratorial pout, eliciting an amused smirk. “When we finally made it out into the fields, we found Heathcliff grinding XP. He was obviously a beta tester, so we asked him for some advice.” His cheerful expression sobers up slightly. “And when the game started, we just stuck together, and that was that.”

She nods slowly. More than once, she’s wondered why Heathcliff decided to take her into the group like he did. They literally had no reason to. She’s just a teenager who was, at first glance, stupid enough to get caught out in the fields by herself and needed rescuing, and they’re a group of friends who are all way stronger than she is, not to mention a handful of years older than her at the least.

But still, she’s never made friends this fast. She’s more of an introvert, and when it came to strangers, Megu did most of the talking between the two of them. Maybe it’s circumstance and coincidence that brought Karma to these three, but it must be something about being forced into an extensive hunger games that brings people together, huh?

“Oh, hey, there they are. Over here, you two!”

She looks up and smiles as Godfree and Heathcliff slide into the seats across from them. “Good hunt?”

“We’re heading out to the next town, Medai, first thing in the morning,” Heathcliff declares, all-business, as usual. “There’s a quest there for some better light armor, which Karma can use.”

At the mention of her name, she straightens up instinctively. “Okay. Awesome.” Once more, she vows to herself to do her best, so she doesn’t drag down the group.

Uzala slumps forward onto the table dramatically. “Does that mean we have to get up early again?”

Heathcliff gives him an unimpressed look. “You ask this every day.”

“No, I don’t!”

“Between you and Godfree, you two ask this every day,” he amends dryly, and Karma hides her grin in her drink, shoulders quivering.

After dinner, a group of NPC minstrels strike up a lively tune, and some players clear a space in the middle of the inn for dancing, which brings a smile to Karma’s face. Compared to the dull, lackluster behavior of many other players, this is a welcome change.

“Aren’t you going to join them?”

She glances at Heathcliff, blinking. “Hmm?”

“You said you like dancing, didn’t you?”

“Oh.” She’s honestly surprised he remembers. “Yeah. Sure.”

An idea pops into her head, and she hops to her feet and does a little twirl to pivot to a stop in front of him, grabbing one of his hands in both of hers. “And you’re coming with me!”

“Wait-”

And so it begins.

\---

_** Training: 11/18/2022, Floor 1 (fields) ** _

At six thirty sharp, Karma rolls out of bed and equips her gear as quietly as she can, slipping out of her room after checking that Heathcliff is still asleep. She knows already that Godfree and Uzala are _heavy_ sleepers, and Heathcliff is an early riser too, but he usually doesn’t get up this early.

She breathes in deeply as she steps out of the inn and heads towards the fields outside the town, clenching and unclenching her hand around her sword handle nervously. It’ll be her first time being alone outside a safe zone, but she has to get more training in. She’s still several levels behind the others, and so far, it’s mostly been them whittling down monsters for her to get the finishing blow.

Heathcliff has also been teaching her about the Sword Skill System and how to trigger it. Godfree wields an axe, and Karma has chosen a sword, so he can’t really teach her much. Uzala has a slightly more similar weaopn, but it’s a glaive, with a very different fighting technique. So Heathcliff is really the only one whose fighting style is close to her style, which she’s still trying to figure out. Her being left-handed has also made things a little harder.

She wrinkles her nose slightly at the mud sucking and squishing under her boots as she walks into the swampy fields, but she shakes off the icky feeling, eyes constantly scanning the terrain for monsters.

Suddenly, she hears splashing, and she ducks behind a gnarled, stunted tree, peering out cautiously. Two player-sized monsters resembling salamanders are trundling along through the murky swamp water, their vibrantly colored, moist skin pulsing at their throats as they breathe. She’s seen these kinds of monsters before, so she feels relatively confident in charging them.

The first one screeches when she strikes it in the flank with a burst of light, leaving a red flaking wound on its side. She dances back when the second one lunges, the mud sucking at her feet as she splashes away, but she charges up another sword skill and drives her sword into the first one’s mouth, killing it in a shower of pixels.

With a yelp, she scrambles out of the water as the second one leaps at her again, splashing her from the waist down with the muddy water, but she breathes a sigh when she hits more solid land. A few more slashes with her sword and the second one dies too, granting her several valuable exp points.

Feeling confident and liking the feeling, she rushes off to find some more foes.

“What are you doing out here?”

About half an hour into her hunt, Karma whirls around, giving a slightly guilty laugh at Heathcliff’s stern expression and stance. “Um…”

“It’s dangerous to go into the fields alone. You know that,” he chastises her, and she frowns at the unneeded reminder.

“I know! But I’ve stayed pretty close to the safe zone,” she reasons, gesturing back at the town about seventy or eighty meters away. “I just wanted to do some more levelling. I’m still behind you and Godfree and Uzala.”

“It’s only been a week since you started. Getting overzealous can be a bad thing,” he warns.

She looks down, nudging the ground with her foot. “I don’t want you guys to have to drag me around all the time…Especially when I asked you to help me.” She has already learned the hard lesson of being useless while watching someone else get hurt.

Heathcliff doesn’t respond for a moment. Then: “Well, when you put it that way, I suppose it would only be logical to help you,” he states with a half-resigned sigh as he shrugs his shield onto his arm and draws his sword.

A tentative smile spreads across her face, and she trots after him, not caring about the gross squishiness in her boots. _“Hai!”_

\---

Karma stiffens, a shiver crawling up her spine, and Heathcliff pauses to glance back at her. “What is it?”

“I don’t know,” she admits, slowly reaching for her sword. “It feels like something really dangerous is c-”

Something erupts out of the water in a torrent of mud and twigs, and she grunts as the wave hits her, dislodging her feet clean from the mud. Heathcliff catches her in time, planting his shield in the mud to anchor them both; when the water starts to settle, Karma peeks out from around the metal rim and gasps.

Towering above them is a five meter tall, very malicious-looking bipedal fish monster with a thick, muscular tail, covered head to tail in glittering, iridescent scales. Karma inhales sharply, sword in her trembling grip. Maybe going out by herself wasn’t such a good idea. It’s just her and Heathcliff; they conveniently left their heaviest hitters snoring away at the inn. The armor appears to be able to withstand pretty much all attacks except from weapons like Godfree and Uzala’s.

“Should we teleport out?” she asks tensely, raising one hand in preparation to open her menu.

Heathcliff is studying the beast thoughtfully. “No. We’ll fight.”

“What?”

The monster lunges, and he shouts, “Scatter!”

They dive in opposite directions, and Karma lands in a stunted tree, raising her sword to activate a skill. If Heathcliff thinks they can fight and win, then she’ll trust his judgement. And if things get hairy, they can always teleport out with crystals. With a cry, she lunges for the beast as it swivels to target Heathcliff.

Her sword hits the top of its head, and Karma hisses at the vibration from the impact with the steel-like scales, thrown off balance. Its HP bar goes down by a pathetic amount, and its eyes glow red as it focuses in on its new target.

A burst of light emits from down below, and the beast’s tail lashes out as Heathcliff manages to score a slightly better wound on it. He dodges away quickly, and she lands next to him with a low curse of frustration.

“The armor is too strong for our swords to break through!” he calls. “Look for its weak spot!”

“Weak spot?”

“On a heavily armored monster like this, it’s bound to have a weak spot. You just have to find it!” He brandishes his shield and sword. “I’ll keep it distracted. You make use of your agility to move around and see if you can find anything.”

Then there’s no more time to talk as the monster lunges in again, water splashing into the air from its attack. Karma runs around its side even as light flashes from the front, where Heathcliff is holding the monster’s attention. She scans the armor as she runs, searching for crevasses and cracks, for a gap in the scales.

“There!” she blurts out, taking a wide circle around its thrashing tail. “When it bends its head, there’s a gap in the armor!”

“I’ll keep distracting it, then! You go in for the kill!”

The opportunity presents itself a minute later. They’ve been switching on and off, but Heathcliff is drawing most of the monster’s aggro to keep it occupied. Karma’s heart leaps into her throat when she sees him suddenly fall to one knee in the water, as if he tripped on some unseen root or stone, and she cries out wordlessly.

In an instant, the monster snaps its head down, jaws open wide, and Heathcliff leaps backwards a split second before its jaws close. “Now!”

Karma is already on the move. She races up the armored back, digging her toes into the space between the armor plates and jumping up to stab her sword into the nape of its neck.

_SCREEE!_

Her field of vision becomes a whirlwind of muddy colors as the monster thrashes, rearing up and twisting side to side, but she hangs on grimly, soaked head to toe by this point. Heathcliff runs in and smashes his shield into the side of its head, stunning it for a brief second, and she yanks her sword out and slashes it one more time across the back of its neck with a defiant shout.

The monster bursts into shards beneath her, and she crashes to the water with a groan, her head still spinning from vertigo. When she sits up, she sees a window in front of her.

_[Congratulations!]_ the system tells her.

Heathcliff helps her up. “Well done.”

A grin stretches across her face at his stoic praise, and all of a sudden, she can’t care less about how muddy and disgusting her clothes are. “I levelled up!”

“There you guys are!”

They turn at the sound of Godfree’s booming voice to see the two other members of their party wading through the swamp with vaguely dismayed looks on their faces. Karma, still riding the victorious high of killing the fish monster (even if it was with a lot of help from Heathcliff), just grins and waves.

“Hey, what took you guys so long?” she asks cheerfully as they come trudging up to them. “Come on, let’s go kill something else!”

She splashes on ahead, and Uzala turns to Heathcliff with a hollow, slightly sleep-ridden stare. “You’ve created a monster.”

\---

_** Why: 12/25/2022, Floor 3 (tavern) ** _

A collective chorus of groans rises from the table, along with near-diabolic laughter from the victor.

“I gotta say, I never pegged you for a poker player,” Godfree says, shaking his head in rueful admiration.

“Can’t believe I just got my ass handed to me by a teenager in a game of poker,” Uzala sighs dramatically, flopping forward face-first onto the table.

Said teenager, the only one in the group, grins like a cat who ate the canary, shuffling the cards with well-practiced motions. “What can I say? I’m just that good.”

“It’s luck,” Muldar says stubbornly, near-pouting.

“My four-win streak begs to differ,” Karma retorts smugly, her grin widening at his childish expression. “Wanna go one more round so I can prove it?”

“I think my ego’s taken enough of a battering for today,” Fultz demurs with a sigh.

“Seconded,” Uzala’s muffled voice agrees from where his face rests on the table.

Karma pouts slightly when none of the others seem to want to play another game, and she glances at Heathcliff, who’s sitting next to her. “What say you?” she asks hopefully, grinning. He was the last or second-to-last to fold in all of the games they played.

“How about a different game?” he suggests evenly, and she sighs, giving him a deadpan look.

“You’re no fun. Fine.” She looks around the table. “Any suggestions? We could play BS?”

Just then, an NPC waitress arrives with a tray of drinks. “Four oldale meads, a black coffee, and apple cider,” she says with a bubbly smile.

“Whose bright idea was it to order mead?” Karma asks in bewilderment, scrunching up her nose.

“That would be me,” Uzala says cheerfully, rubbing his hands together in anticipation as the NPC sets the tankards down. “Hey, let’s play ring of fire!”

Karma stares. “...Isn’t that a drinking game?”

“Yeah! Duh!”

“Ring of fire depends on whether or not we can actually get drunk in SAO,” Fultz objects. Then he blinks. “...Can we?”

Heathcliff shrugs, staring into his own black coffee (of course). “Nothing happens to your physical bodies, but the NerveGear will mimic the effect based on how much you drink and your actual tolerance-”

Uzala lets out a hoot of delight. “Sweet! Guys, let’s do this!”

As the guys start the game, the token girl of the group, and also the token juvenile of the group by at least seven years, facepalms.

“Why?” she asks despairingly, turning to Heathcliff. “Why did you have to tell them that?!”

He gives her a look. “Do you think they wouldn’t have figured it out eventually?”

“Hey, are you in or out?” Muldar asks Heathcliff, who holds up a hand.

“I’ll pass.”

“Come on, it’s Christmas! Where’s your sense of adventure?!” Godfree cajoles, having somehow already downed half his drink before the game even started.

“Someone has to stay sober enough to make sure you all don’t get too out of control, and I doubt Karma wants that job.”

“No. No, I do not.”

Instead of looking anywhere near as apprehensive as Karma feels, Heathcliff just watches the guys set up the cards with mild boredom.

“Think of it this way,” he says. “My telling them that getting drunk is an option ensures that they’ll get drunk faster because they know the game will work and they’ll go straight to it, and then we likely won’t be up quite so late.”

“...Likely.”

He lets out a long-suffering sigh and sips his coffee. “Yes. Likely.”

“Hey, Karma, you wanna try some?” Uzala asks loudly, despite being in the next seat over, with a huge grin, thrusting his tankard of mead at her.

She stares at him like he’s a lunatic (not inaccurate). “I’m seventeen.”

In response, he just grins wider and waggles the jug at her a bit. She deadpans, scooching back to avoid spillage on her avatar (and possible bursting of her eardrums). “No.”

He just shrugs and takes a swig of it. “More for me!”

To no one in particular, she remarks, “I have this weird feeling of, ‘I’m way too young for this’, and also a weird feeling of, ‘I’m way too old for this’.”

Heathcliff sighs again. “I feel the same way.”

Eventually, Karma and Heathcliff end up relocating to a smaller table by the fireplace where they can keep an eye on the guys without feeling like their eardrums are about to burst, or being within range of potential projectile vomiting.

“Is that really possible?” she asks in blatant shock when Heathcliff mentions that, and he just nods. At a loss for what to say, she leans back in her seat with her drink. “What the hell was Kayaba on when he made this game…?” There have been times when she’s felt nauseous, either from being shaken and tossed around by huge monsters or from strong emotions such as fear and shock and confusion and panic, but she never thought she could actually throw up from that nausea.

He looks vaguely amused. “That’s what stands out to you?”

“Besides the whole game of death thing? Kind of, yeah. Like, who even thinks of those little things, y’know?”

“A perfectionist,” he offers as an answer. “If you’re going to force players to live like real people, you’re obliged to make the world as realistic as possible.”

With a hum of agreement, Karma daintily tips back her glass of apple cider between her fingertips and drains the last of it, then glances over at Heathcliff. Although she’s quite glad that he’s not taking part in this absurdity, she does wonder what he’s like when he’s drunk.

_“Ne,”_ she says to get his attention. “Have you ever actually been drunk?”

He raises his eyebrows at the question, then glances back at the guys. “Yes. Once or twice.”

“Really,” she says to herself, fascinated. “What kind of drunk are you? Do you know?”

“Why do you want to know?” he asks, sounding half bemused, half annoyed.

She shrugs, smirking. “I’m just curious.” It’s only been two months, and she still doesn’t know much about him. People don’t seem to like talking about their real lives, but even with that, she feels like she knows Godfree and Uzala much better than she knows their cool, calm, collected leader.

He shifts in his seat with a weary sigh. “Well, mostly, I do things I typically wouldn’t do. Lowered inhibitions. That’s why I don’t drink much.”

“Hmm.”

She nods in thanks when a waiter takes her empty glass away and leans back against the wall behind her with a sigh, eyes half-lidded. The fireplace is roaring merrily, the guys’ yelling has more or less become background noise, and the sound of so many familiar voices is almost kind of nice.

Suddenly, Karma jerks out of a light doze when she starts to slip off of her chair, and she quickly rights herself with a muttered curse--although it can’t be heard over the guys yelling and laughing and generally being lunatics.

“You can go to sleep if you want,” Heathcliff says from across the table, but she shakes her head, rubbing her eyes.

“I’m good. I wouldn’t want to abandon you to deal with…” She waves a hand vaguely at the guys. “Whatever they’re doing now. I think they’ve moved on to a different game.”

He gives a noncommittal hum, and she turns to face the fire, basking in its heat, and says aloud, “It’s pretty impressive, huh? The scope of detail in this game.”

She can feel his calculating stare. “How so?”

“The fire, for one.” She holds out her hands to warm them, letting her eyelids droop. “It feels very real. And smells like it. And it stings your eyes if you get too close to it. It’s nice. All these little things, none of them really matter in the core gameplay, but without it, the whole VR experience wouldn’t be what it is.” With a wrinkle of her nose, she adds, “Although, I don’t know if I’d be too heartbroken if the, um, projectile vomiting feature was excluded.”

When there’s no response, she looks up, only to see Heathcliff smiling vaguely at her, and she blinks. “What?”

He just shakes his head, still smiling with a sort of mystery. “Nothing.”

She tilts her head, intrigued. She occasionally catches him looking sort of amused at the others’ antics (including hers), but it’s always fleeting, and then it’s back to that expressionless commander visage again.

Suddenly, they hear a loud clatter and some inane shrieking that might be considered laughter, and they both glance over at the guys.

“Guys, guys, guys!” Godfree hollers, red in the face with a delirious grin. “This ale tastes just like sake!”

“Yes! Let’s get _smashed!”_ Uzala declares loudly, despite the fact that he and the others are _already_ smashed and have been for a _while._

He stands up, then promptly kisses the floor. Godfree looks like he’s going to follow suit at any moment.

“Maybe we should call it a night,” Heathcliff suggests, and Karma nods rapidly.

“Seconded.”

\---

_** Outvoted: 1/10/2022, Floor 2 (safe zone) ** _

“Wheeee!”

Karma laughs in exhilaration, the cold air tickling the insides of her nose and throat and lungs in the best way. “I forgot how fun this was!”

At a startled yelp, she turns around to see Uzala fall down hard on his rear end, arms flailing. Godfree, who was right behind him, shrieks, “Look out look out look-”

Karma winces, grinning, as the axe-wielder topples down on top of his comrade, the two men flailing around in a very loud and very helpless pile of limbs. Fultz and Muldar try to sort them out, and Karma giggles to herself, gliding off on NPC-rented ice skates towards the last member of their party.

“Having fun?” she asks Heathcliff as she skates a circle around him and comes to a stop in front, grinning widely.

He gives her an even look. “Sure,” he says, in a tone that indicates he’d rather be doing something, quote unquote, more _productive._

She makes a half-amused, half-exasperated face. “Jeez. Come on, you can’t just stand around forever.”

“I beg to dif-”

Without waiting for him to finish, she grabs his hand and takes off, looking back and grinning at his startled expression. Her strength parameters aren’t all that high right now, but the lack of friction makes it easy to pull him along.

“You push yourself along by putting the back blade perpendicular to your front and pushing off, and you alternate like that,” she explains, indicating her own feet as an example. “To turn, you just turn a little bit, and I find it easiest to just push off hard and use one foot to make a wide turn.”

He seems to pick it up quickly, which is unsurprising. “How do you stop?”

“You can turn both blades inward, or drag one blade behind you. Generally, try to be going pretty slow when stopping.”

She leaves him to practice and makes her way over to the others. “How’s it going?” she asks cheekily.

Uzala pouts at her, and nearly falls over upon breaking concentration. “Gah! It’s--it’s not going so good!”

She snickers. “Yeah, I noticed. Here, I’ll give you a few tips…”

After another half hour or so, they’ve sort of picked up a shaky, baby-step-like rhythm. Muldar and Fultz look a little better, and Heathcliff’s doing pretty good.

Suddenly, Karma has an idea. It's a stupid one, but those ones are usually the best, aren't they?

“Hey! We should have a free for all duel!” It’s a safe zone, after all, so no damage will be done. And even though weapon durability can still go down in a safe zone, she finds it very unlikely that anyone’s weapons will actually find their marks.

“Yes!” Uzala agrees enthusiastically, throwing both fists into the air emphatically (and nearly falling over again). “I think I’m getting the hang of this!”

“I bet I can do better than you!” Godfree challenges him with a grin, and the two start bickering.

Muldar and Fultz glance at each other and shrug. “I’m down,” Fultz says.

“Might be fun to watch,” Muldar snickers, resting a hand on his sword handle.

Heathcliff sighs out a puff of condensation. “I don’t think-”

Karma mows right over his protest. “Too bad! You’re outvoted!” She draws her sword, brandishing it above her head. “Everyone for themselves, let’s go!”

Hours later, Karma and the guys, sans Heathcliff, all but collapse in their temporary headquarters, a small rented apartment, soaked to the skin by a veritable ton of snowballs. Heathcliff is a little more graceful, having avoided a lot of the crossfire by utilizing his tower shield, but he too is more than a little damp as he sits down on the couch after getting the fire going.

Having gone all but untouched on the frozen pond but not so much in the subsequent snowball fight, Karma rolls over on the carpet, giggling inanely. “I hate you all.”

A poorly-aimed pillow bounces next to her head, along with a groan of, “Love you too,” from Uzala.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave a review and let me know what you think! :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's where the fun begins XD

_** Debriefing: 4/20/2023 ** _

Without bothering to knock, Karma walks in. “Yo. Hope you didn’t miss me too much.” A weak smile tugs at the corner of her lips as she tries to force her normal cheerful snark.

Heathcliff looks up from a stack of paperwork on his desk and sighs. He seems to consider telling her to knock next time, then decides it’s futile. “Well?”

_“What did you need me for?”_

_“Orange guilds. They’re becoming more and more of a threat to players. The front lines are gaining momentum, but we still need more players, and we won’t get them if the orange guilds are picking them off.”_

_“...What do you want me to do?”_

Quickly and efficiently, Karma summarizes the last week--where she went, who she talked to, when and where she confronted the orange guild.

_“This one has been operating on Floor 20 for a while, stealing items and occasionally killing players. One surviving member of a party they attacked has been asking for people to deal with the orange guild. Asuna-kun told me what happened with those three orange players who tried to rob the two of you. I want you to go hunt these ones down, and bring them in. Do you think you’re up to it?”_

_“..._ Hai. _You can count on me.”_

“I had a little bit of trouble with the fight,” she admits reluctantly. “They added two more members since my source of information heard, so there were seven total. I was able to subdue them eventually by picking them off, but it was close.” She takes a deep breath, holding her voice deliberately steady. “I had to kill one in self-defense when he wouldn’t stop attacking. Luckily, he seemed to be the leader, so the others surrendered pretty fast…”

_Karma made her way towards the teleport gate of the Town of Beginnings, chewing on some crusty, rock-hard bread bought from an NPC stall, all on autopilot. Her sword felt unusually heavy at her hip, and although it didn’t actually weigh any differently at all, she felt off-kilter nonetheless._

_On her way to the gate, she passed by the clear, bubbling fountain in the middle of the plaza, decorated with a statue of a swordsman and swordswoman brandishing their weapons proudly. She finished the bread and bent over the edge of the fountain, splashing some cool water onto her face in an attempt to feel some semblance of clarity. With a splutter, she shook her head rapidly, droplets flying, and used the edge of her cloak to wipe off the remaining moisture._

_She caught a glimpse of herself in the fountain. Her hands were_ still _shaking._

_Without warning, her stomach heaved, and she vomited, bracing her hands against the cool limestone and clenching until her knuckles turned white. Gasping and retching slightly, she stared blankly at the lumpy, greenish bile, and the poorly digested chunks of soggy bread floating in the fountain, obscuring her reflection. Seconds later, it vanished, leaving the fountain water a pristine mirror again, but she wiped her mouth anyways and stumbled towards the teleport gate, breathing ragged still._

Heathcliff nods slowly, contemplative. “If the orange guilds can recruit so easily, they might become a bigger problem than we thought.”

She hums disconsolately in agreement. She can still taste bile in her throat.

“It’s really bad. That--that one man I had to kill. He was…” A shiver claws up her spine when she remembers his face, burned into her memory. Even now, his gleeful shriek, bulging eyes, and the absolutely insane expression he wore upon death rattles in her ears, appears to her every time she closes her eyes for more than a fraction of a second, as if determined never to let her rest.

The giggling cuts off when she feels a firm hand on her shoulder, and Heathcliff, who’s suddenly standing in front of her, gives her a measured look. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Yeah,” she whispers, taking a deep breath; she has to be alright, she can’t let this weigh her down. Desperate, she anchors herself to his calm presence, and she feels an overwhelming urge to say something.

“It’s...It’s not the first time I’ve...killed someone.”

For the first time, she thinks she has surprised her commander. “It isn’t?”

“No.” It pushes and pulls at her, always unwanted, always jarringly _there_. “When you found me...That dire wolf didn’t attack me for nothing. Players were trying to MPK me. They reduced my HP to red first...I killed one of them before I ran, but I didn’t get far before the dire wolf caught up to me. You came just in time…but you didn’t see the wolf slaughter those other players before turning on me.”

She lets out a hollow laugh. “You wouldn’t think so, but the first PK of the game wasn’t even by an orange player. It was me. In the first week of the game.” The memories threaten to swallow her whole, so she adds almost jokingly, in a tone too dry, “Well, unless someone did it before me, but I doubt-”

She gasps when he pulls her in gently with one hand on her back--light, unrestricting, with plenty of room to run. But instead, she finds herself clinging tightly to her commander, fists balled up in the back of his jacket. She presses her lips together to keep from breaking down completely and leans her forehead against his shoulder, taking a deep, shuddering breath.

“I had my suspicions,” he admits, and she squeaks softly.

“Y-you did?” she asks as she withdraws, wiping her eyes hurriedly.

“I don’t know if Godfree or Uzala noticed that night. If they did, they didn’t say anything. But I saw the mark where a throwing pick hit your shoulder.”

She feels slightly dizzy. “So--so, you knew-”

“I knew you’d had run-ins with orange players before. I couldn’t know for sure what exactly happened, though.” He gives her a small smile. “Thank you for trusting me with that. I know it can’t have been easy to share, or to do what I asked of you, but you did well.”

Bewildered by the influx of conflicting emotions--her past anguish, relief at the burden of secrecy lessened, lingering horror at her fight with the orange guild, pride in her commander’s praise of her--she struggles to put together a coherent response. Her soul feels raw, exposed. But with that awful weight of secrecy and fear of judgement somewhat mitigated, it feels liberating. And safe.

“Thank you,” she finally whispers. “For listening to me, and...everything.”

He gives a shake of his head, as if saying, ‘no problem’. “I’m here whenever you need me, Karma.” At her startled look, he shrugs slightly with a dry smile. “You’re here whenever I need you. It seems only fair.” He pats her shoulder and moves past her to the door. “Godfree and Uzala have organized a duelling session. I told them about your mission, and they thought it might be prudent to at least get somewhat familiar with fighting other players. Do you feel up to it?”

Her head is still reeling from his off-handed comment, but she nods rapidly. “Of course! Oh, uh…” She shuffles her feet a bit. “You...you won’t tell anyone, right? I don’t know if I’m ready for other people to know quite yet…” It’s not really that she thinks they’re going to judge her. She’s cognizant enough to know that none of it was her fault, and they’re intelligent enough to know it too. It’s just a sensitive part of her life that she still keeps part of in the shadows.

Heathcliff nods, as if it’s obvious. “Of course.” He places one hand on the doorknob. “And when you’re ready, you can open up about the rest.”

Karma stiffens in surprise, but surprise turns to a sort of resignation as she shakes her head and follows her commander out the door, smiling. _“Hai…”_

\---

Nautilus groans as Godfree is knocked to the ground. “How many is that now?”

“Six,” Karma informs him helpfully, smiling as Godfree resignedly accepts Heathcliff’s hand up. “He’s good.”

“Yeah, you’re telling me!”

A bemused voice suddenly asks, “Training?”

Karma nearly cricks her neck in whirling around. “Asuna!”

She grabs the girl in a tight hug, spinning her around once, and the brunette squeaks at the sudden affectionate gesture. “Woah--hurk! Can’t...breathe…”

“You don’t need to breathe in here,” Karma reminds her with a wink, but she sets her down anyway. The pressure of the last few days--hunting down leads, piecing together locations and those minute details--has been building, piece by piece, and she didn’t even realize it until it was gone. Just the simple need to constantly look over one shoulder every time she stepped out of a safe zone, paranoid that someone was onto the fact that she was onto them, was suffocating.

Being here right now, amongst friends and family she would trust with her life, is enough to clear the haze in her mind, and make her feel human again. If she doesn’t think too hard, everything kind of seems ten times funnier.

She’s still worn out, that much is for sure. The others know her well enough to know that she hasn’t been her usual self, but they don’t push her on it. They just keep being their own usual, goofy selves, and that’s the greatest thing they can do for her.

Asuna sticks her tongue out childishly and glances at Heathcliff and Godfree, who are talking about the duel. “Duelling, huh?”

“He’s had six straight wins against all of us,” Nautilus complains good-naturedly.

She glances at Karma. “Even you?”

Karma tilts her head. “No, actually. I haven’t fought him yet. Only Segro and Uzala.”

Nautilus pounces, clapping her on the back enthusiastically. “Go duel him! I bet you can take him down!”

A crooked smirk spreads across her face, and she pulls up her menu.

Heathcliff raises an eyebrow when a duel invitation pops up, and he looks up to see Karma drawing her sword from its scabbard as she walks over to stand across from him.

“I’ve been told, by Nautilus, to kick your butt,” she informs him.

“Oh?” is his reply, amused. “Were those his exact words?”

“No, he was a little more crass about it.”

“Oi!”

Heathcliff gives a dry chuckle. “As I suspected.”

He draws his sword as well with a metallic _shrring!_ and takes his position across from her as the timer counts down. Neither of them have full HP, since they’ve been duelling for about half an hour now with their guildmates, but since it’s just one-strike, it shouldn’t be a problem.

She takes a deep breath, resting her off hand on the hilt of her sword absently. A sword that has taken a life.

The timer _dings,_ and the duel begins.

Karma takes off like a dragonfly, darting back and forth rapidly, and their swords clash with a harsh metallic cry. Since she’s left-handed, the most efficient way for him to block is with his own sword, rendering his shield less effective. His stalwart defense is his real asset, and with it mitigated, she has a distinct advantage, especially with her natural agility. A grin spreads across her face.

“I can’t believe it,” Uzala mutters in amazement as dust flies around the two duellists--an impregnable fortress and a glass cannon, locked in a dance only they know the steps to. “She’s forcing him back.”

“He’s still fighting back, though,” Asuna points out.

She deflects a series of lightning fast slashes and stabs. A thin line of red pixels is splashed onto her cheek when she’s a little too slow in her movements, but it’s not a hard enough hit to end the duel. She bends backwards nearly double, going slightly cross-eyed as his sword whistles over her head, and rolls away nimbly to regain her bearings. Heathcliff regards her steadily, simply readjusting himself to face her.

She has the advantage. He doesn’t know what it’s like to face down another player in a pitched duel. Sure, they’re not fighting for their lives here, but she can use her experience when she was to her advantage. And on top of that, she’s left-handed against his right. He’s better than her, but she can win this, as long as she stays light on her feet.

In a blur of red, she lunges, charging a sword skill. His eyes glint, and he sets his feet.

With a dissonant scrape of metal, he forces her blade to the side, as if predicting her moves. As the system tries to reorient her into the correct position for the next attack, his shield comes back, then forward with all the force of a battering ram. At this point, she can’t redirect herself.

At the same time, she lets go of her sword, and the glow fades.

His eyes widen in shock, and his movements falter for a split second from his surprise as she drops to her knees and bends back, sliding just centimeters below the edge of his shield. He whirls around, just in time for her to slam her fist into the edge of his shield, shoving it to the side with a martial arts skill. In one fluid movement, she scoops up her sword and lunges, the point of her weapon aimed straight for his chest, deadly intent flashing in her razor gaze, and a dark surge of imminent triumph rushes through her.

In that fraction of a second before she strikes, she realizes that this isn’t pretend, his HP will go down when she hits him, and she’s aiming for a vital area. She’s aiming to kill, and this _isn’t an enemy!_

She curses loudly and throws herself to the side at the last second, skidding to a stop about two or three meters away, sword point resting in the dirt. Her artificial heartbeat jackhammers at the close call, and her hands tremble.

“I’m sorry,” she gasps, panting despite not needing air. “I’m sorry. Oh, god, I’m so sorry, I don’t--I-” For a second, she’s surrounded. Orange cursors blink threateningly, and-

“Karma!” A gentle but firm shake to her shoulders jerks her back into reality, and Heathcliff stares down at her sternly. “You’re safe. You’re here, with us.”

Her chest heaves for air, and she brings the back of her shaking hand to press against her forehead. She takes a deep breath, trying to force her frayed nerves to calm down. Her troops don’t need to watch her have a breakdown. She doesn’t want them thinking she’s too unstable to lead them when she has to.

“I’m sorry about that,” she finally says, only the slightest tremor in her voice.

He just squeezes her shoulders again and lowers his hands. “Perhaps you should take a break for the day.”

Shame at her own complete overreaction churns in her stomach. “That’s...probably for the best.” If she wasn’t fast enough, or if her opponent was less skilled than Heathcliff is, that could’ve ended really badly. She shivers at the thought.

“It’s not your fault. It’s mine for making you come to training today,” he says with an apologetic dip of his head, and she balks slightly.

“No, I was the one who agreed. I should’ve known better than to push myself,” she says quickly.

He gives her a look. “Would you have said no even if you did know better?”

She flushes red. He’s got her there. With a knowing tilt of his head, he adds, “I forfeit, by the way.”

Karma blinks rapidly in surprise, even as the winner icon appears to her. “Wh…”

“You would’ve won. I had no way to block that attack.” He smiles ruefully, with a touch of admiration. “I never saw your attack coming. Obviously, though, you saw mine. I’d quite like to know how.”

“Well,” she says, in an attempt to put some sense to it; to be honest, even she’s not quite sure how it happened. “Players are smarter than monsters. Even the most complex AIs have patterns and set behavior. But humans are different. I guess I’ve just learned that you have to expect the unexpected; that’s the only way you’ll survive.”

The others are celebrating when she makes her way back to them, and Nautilus claps her heartily on the back. “That’s our leader for you, taking down the boss!”

“That was awesome!” Asuna cheers loudly, copper eyes gleaming.

“That feint was pretty gutsy,” Godfree tells her with a huge grin. “How’d you come up with it?”

She smiles widely. If they’re at all put off or disturbed by her near-lethal attack and her momentary lapse in sanity, they don’t show it, and she loves them all the more for it.

“Actually, I got the idea from this anime called _Assassination Classroom_ ,” she explains. “I got my handle from the name of my favorite character.”

Sanza, one of their newer members, gapes at her. “Dude, I love that show! You’re talking about Akabane Karma, right?”

Her smile turns to a full-on grin. “Which other cute little red-headed knife-wielding sadist do you know of?”

“So was the feint from that capture the flag episode? With the Nagisa-Karma fight?”

“Yeah, actually, my starting weapon was a knife, not a sword, you see…”

\---

Karma ties off the last of Asuna’s hair and smiles. “Done.”

“Thanks.” She stands up and flops back onto her own bed to start putting on her gear. “It’s nice having you back.”

“It’s nice to be back,” she replies honestly. She didn’t realize how much she missed being home until she arrived.

“The leader missed you.”

Karma’s fingers stutter to a stop on her own menu, and she blinks at the brunette. “...Really?”

“Well, at the very least, it took him a while to find his feet,” Asuna says with a wry smirk. “It didn’t exactly look like it, but I could tell.”

_Asuna cleared her throat, watching Heathcliff manipulating his menu with a look of utmost concentration. “...Er,_ danchou? _Do you need any help?”_

_It took him a while to respond; he barely looked up before replying, obviously distracted, “Yes. Can you get me one of those...from...the place with the...things?”_

_Asuna blinked slowly. “...Sure. I’ll get you one of those from the place with the things. As soon as you tell me what those, place, and things are.”_

_She’d said it with a straight face, but she couldn’t withhold a snicker when realization dawned on his face._

Karma doesn’t stop laughing for a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Assassination Classroom is so good. Karma's my favorite character.


	6. Chapter 6

**_Black Roses: 5/23/2023_ **

Karma has never heard a scream come from the throat of someone so _young,_ nor does she want to ever again.

She drops to her knees next to the curled-up ball quivering on the forest floor, wrapping her arms gently around the small player’s shoulders. “Hey, hey, it’s okay, you’re not gonna die,” she whispers soothingly, rubbing their shoulders in an attempt to comfort them.

The tear-streaked, young, wide-eyed face of a small boy peers up at her in complete bewilderment, and her heart aches. He can’t be older than ten. “I-I-I’m not?”

She forces a smile, wondering who the hell let this kid play a VRMMORPG about killing stuff in the face. “The monsters are gone, aren’t they?”

He sniffles loudly and wipes his face sloppily with his sleeve. “D-did you b-beat them up, onee-san?”

This kid is so cute and it’s killing her. “Yep. Sure did,” she says with a toothy grin. “Piece of cake. What’s your name? I’m Karma.”

“K-Kota.”

“Okay. Can I call you Kota-kun?”

He nods shyly. “Mmmhmm.”

She smiles, patting his head once. “Do you have any teleport crystals?” He shakes his head. “That’s fine, I have some for both of us. Let’s head back to town.”

He opens his mouth to answer, but is cut off by an almighty roar--from the depths of his stomach. She laughs at his blush.

“And get some dinner,” she adds with a grin, opening her inventory for crystals.

\---

As Karma and Kota make their way down the street, Karma is wondering what to do with this kid. She has to meet someone soon, and she doesn’t want to take the kid along. But then again, she’s not about to just leave him somewhere and hope he stays there.

They enter a large plaza-like area, and Karma’s gaze sweeps the area. She catches the eye of her informant, who gives her a clearly skeptical look. Karma rolls her eyes and makes a ‘no big deal’ hand motion.

She spots a few stalls set up like a market on one side of the plaza. Kota does, too, going by the way his gaze seems riveted on the colorful flags.

“Hey, those look cool, huh?” she says with a smile, and he nods enthusiastically. “I have some things to take care of, but we can go check them out after I’m done, okay?”

“Okay, onee-san,” he agrees, eyes sparkling. The terror of ten minutes past seems to have abated, to her relief.

“Good kid. Stay close, alright?”

_“Hai.”_

With him trotting along obediently by her side, she makes her way over to the whiskered young woman sitting cloaked on a bench. “Hey, Argo.”

The info-broker’s gaze lands critically on Kota, who edges behind Karma slightly, and Karma sighs. “Don’t scare him, would you?”

“Hmph,” Argo huffs, springing to her feet and making a ‘gimme’ motion. “Well? Pay up.”

She opens up a trade window, transferring the agreed-upon amount of col to Argo, who accepts it with a satisfied hum.

“They don’t have an official headquarters, but they meet here in Ronbaru for guild meetings in that seedy little cafe by the NPC blacksmith,” she says without further ado. “They’re famed for sleep-PK-ing. Word is that they’ve got a special infiltration agent. They’ve already hit some pretty strong guilds, like the Tiger Claws.”

She stiffens, and Kota asks, voice quavering. “O-onee-san?”

She places a hand on his shoulder gently, inwardly reeling in shock, keeping her eyes trained on Argo. “The Tiger Claws?” she echoes in disbelief. “I know they’re not on our level, or even that of DDA, but they’ve been rising pretty fast.”

“They were a small guild. Ten members, if that. There’s about a dozen Black Roses members, all experienced orange players--that I know of.” the info-broker says darkly, the whiskers on her face drooping with her scowl.

Kota jumps slightly with a scared squeak, and she squeezes his shoulder. “Anything else?”

Argo grins. “Oh, I got your money’s worth, right here.”

A few minutes later, she walks away with a determined spring in her step. Argo provided her with some very valuable information--like their next targets, their frequented spots for exp grinding, their names and appearances, even an approximation of some of their voices, one of Argo’s curious but handy talents.

“Wh-what was that about?” Kota asks, looking a bit pale.

“Don’t worry about it,” she reassures him. “This is just my job. Hey, so now that I’m done with work, you wanna go check out those stalls? I think I see an ice cream stand over there.”

His expression livens up considerably. “Yes! Let’s go, onee-san!” he cheers, nearly pulling her arm out of her socket in his haste. Kids bounce back from negativity so quickly.

She gets him a vanilla ice cream and herself a strawberry. “This is really good, _ne,_ Kota-kun?”

“Mmmhmm!” There’s a few flecks of ice cream on his face, and she grins fondly at that and the pure bliss in his expression. “It’s so good! I haven’t had ice cream since my onee-san-”

He cuts off abruptly, his expression melting into one of out-of-place melancholy, and a blue shard of sadness stabs into her heart. It’s not hard for her to guess what happened.

This isn’t _fair._ He’s so young, he doesn’t deserve to know what that’s like, he doesn’t deserve to wear that expression that says, ‘I’m sad,’ somehow without any words.

She considers offering some of her own experiences in an attempt at consolation. But she doesn’t need to make him more sad. What does she do?

So she wraps her arm around his small shoulders. “I can be your onee-san. Just for today, though. I already have a full-time job,” she adds apologetically. She’s heard rumors of a refuge for young kids in the Town of Beginnings; maybe it’s worth checking out. As much as she adores this little kid, she knows she can’t take care of him forever. She already has a job that requires her to be alert, on her guard at all times, and that’s no place for a kid.

For now, though, when he beams at her and agrees so happily, she decides to forget all of that. Just for a few hours.

\---

Karma sighs, exhausted, as she pulls the covers up to a sleeping Kota’s chin, before turning off the lamp and quietly slipping out of the inn room. It has been a very long day.

A message alert suddenly pops up in the corner of her vision, and she taps on it.

_[Update?]_

She pulls up the keyboard, quickly dodging someone coming down the hall with a quiet ‘Sorry’, and types away as she sidles into her own inn room and nudges the door shut.

_[Going well. I’ll start the real search tomorrow.]_ After a moment of hesitation, she adds, _[They hit the Tiger Claws.]_

While he responds to that, she takes off her armor and turns off the lamp, settling back comfortably against the headboard of her bed.

_[These orange guilds are quite troublesome.]_

_[You’re telling me. How’s the guild?]_

_[Fine. We recruited some fresh new blood.]_

Something twinges in her chest. _[Keeping Asuna busy?]_

_[Of course. She has three new recruits to shepherd now.]_

_[And the others?]_

_[They both have one more recruit each.]_

_[Wow. Y’all have been busy...Anything else?]_

_[We’ve made our way to the sixth floor of the labyrinth.]_

_[Ahead of schedule, I see.]_

They talk for some more time, until Karma glances up at the clock and realizes it’s almost midnight. _[Okay, I’m going to sleep. I have to get up early tomorrow. You sleep too.]_

_[Good night, Karma.]_

_[Seriously. Go to sleep. I know how you are.]_

There’s no reply, of course, and she rolls her eyes before burrowing into her covers with a content sigh. She’ll nag him when she gets back. He’s getting off easy this time.

Right on the verge of sleep, she suddenly hears the teleportation SFX.

_“They’re famed for sleep-PK-ing.”_

In her room.

_Oh._

\---

Karma flings open Heathcliff’s office door and throws herself down in the chair across from his desk with a groan.

“Long mission, I take it,” he comments idly, poring over the labyrinth map.

There are so many things she could say. “I got sold out by a ten-year-old.”

That gets his attention, and he looks up at her with a raised eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

_Karma’s heart was jackhammering in her chest like never before, with every creak of the floorboard, every soft exhale from the intruder, growing louder and louder until he was right next to her, one hand reaching over to pull her covers back._

_She very nearly gave it away when he grabbed her hand, and it took every ounce of willpower she had to keep her hand limp, her body loose, her breathing even, her eyes shut while he manipulated her menu. Her artificial heartbeat was so loud that all she could think about was how he was sure to hear it; it was like a war drum, its tempo increasing by the second._

_At the first_ shrrring! _she heard, she lashed out like a coiled viper, kicking him into the opposite wall, disarming him and slamming his face into the floorboards faster than you could say ‘sleep-PK’._

“He surrendered pretty fast,” she summarizes, propping up her face on her hand. “Especially when I reminded him that the duel was technically still on. I sent him to prison, after getting exact names and locations of everyone in the Black Roses and all the green players without the guild’s brand--and how he got into my room.”

Somehow, Kota had found an opportunity to key a teleport crystal to her room for the sleep-PK-er. When she asked how a little boy had come to be a part of a player-killing guild, unwilling to believe it, she was told that the guild forced him and his sister to enlist after saving their lives. His sister died several months ago, and when his efficiency as a spy and eavesdropper decreased, they tossed him out and left him to die.

The prime opportunity to rejoin them was presented to him that very night, in the form of Karma. He contacted the only guild member who pitied him and didn’t remove him from their friends list, and was offered a chance to redeem himself.

When Karma went to his room after dragging the would-be sleep-PK-er to the Black Iron Palace, he was long gone.

Heathcliff listens silently while she recounts the rest of her week, which consisted of tracking down the guild members, one by one; eventually, all thirteen orange players were accounted for, as well as three more posing as green players. The only one unaccounted for is Kota.

“By himself, he’s not going to be killing anyone, so I thought it’d be safe to leave him alone, now that the rest of the guild is locked up,” she finishes with a sigh. “I want to help him, but I don’t know how I would track him down. Even then…”

How many children’s lives were ruined by this game? And who thought it would be a good idea to let children as young as Kota, maybe even younger, play a game full of killers? Granted, they probably didn’t send the kids in by themselves, likely with an older sibling or a parent, like with Kota and his sister, but still.

Karma wonders if he even knows what he’s been doing, but the fact that he tried to get her killed proves that he does--and he did it anyway. It’s hard to believe that such an innocent child would do that, but Karma knows better now.

Heathcliff seems to be deep in thought. “So what you’re saying,” he finally says, “is that my staying up late at night actually saved your life.”

Her jaw drops at his statement, and at what might just be the slightest glimmer of amusement in his steel gray eyes.

He quickly leans out of the way of a throwing pick that clatters to the floor behind him, triggering an ‘immortal object’ warning from the wall.

“Quit being such an annoying smartass!” she snaps irritably, half standing from her seat. “That is total BS and you know it!”

“Ahem.”

She whirls around to see Asuna peering in. “Am I interrupting?” the brunette asks sarcastically, leaning against the doorframe with a perfectly deadpan look.

The commander just looks amused by all of this, and she says, “Screw you,” before leaving with a huff, followed by a very, very entertained Asuna.

\---

_** Lucky Charms: 6/21/2023 ** _

Karma’s stomach growls threateningly at her as she trudges up the street to the inn. Practically salivating at the prospect of hot food, she pulls open the wooden doors-

-and nearly collides head on with someone.

They both jump back at the same time with hasty apologies, and then they do that awkward thing where they both edge to the same side a few times, trying to pass each other-

“Natsuki-chan?”

Karma freezes up, eyes going wide at the name--her real name--and she stares at the other person, a teenage girl her own age with shamrock green hair. “...Kotori-chan?”

The two girls goggle at each other for a few seconds, then Karma’s old classmate breaks into a huge grin, dimples and all. “Wow! It really is you! Man, you look the exact same!”

“And you have green hair,” Karma comments, still more or less shell-shocked.

She giggles, running a hand through her pixie cut. “Hehe, yeah. My name’s Clover in the game, so. Figured I’d go with a whole motif and all.”

“Oh. Uh, I’m Karma.” Her real name makes her uncomfortable in a way she didn’t think was possible.

“Awesome. Here, come in, let’s catch up and stuff, if you’re not busy! Sorry for almost running you over.”

“No, no, it was my bad…”

They sit down, and Karma orders dinner from the NPC. “Aren’t you getting anything?”

“Oh, I already ate.” To the NPC, she adds, “I’ll have a green tea, though.”

The NPC nods and leaves, and Clover props her chin up on her hands, eyes bright. “I gotta say, I didn’t expect you of all people to pick up SAO.”

Karma smiles awkwardly, back stiff in her seat. “I was persuaded.”

Their drinks arrive quickly, although that doesn’t deter Clover. Between sipping her tea, she chatters on. “It’s been a while since you quit the studio. Wonder how they’re getting on without us now. We made states last year, by the way.”

Karma cups her hands around her coffee. “I heard, congrats.”

“Thanks!”

“Nice earring,” she adds, noticing the studs on Clover’s left ear, akin to the ones she wears in real life.

Clover grins, flicking the four-leaf clover charm. “Cute, right? We got them custom-made. Lucille--that’s Haruhi--has a cherry blossom.”

Karma blinks at the familiar name. “She’s in the game too?”

“Yeah, we play together. It’s a lot of fun! So, what weapon do you use?”

“A one-handed sword. You?”

“A katana. Fighting’s super fun, isn’t it?” She grins. “I can jump _super_ high in the game, and it’s awesome. I can actually do, like, double backflips and stuff. It’ll be great training for when we make it back out.”

A more genuine smile tugs at Karma’s lips. “Yeah, I know what you mean. Sometimes I find myself incorporating old routines and stuff into fights.”

“I know, right?” Clover casts an appraising look over her. “Your stuff’s pretty high-level. Looks like you’re doing pretty well for yourself.”

She shrugs, picking self-consciously at the edges of her cloak. “Yeah, I guess. You too, though.”

Clover keeps talking, but Karma feels so _awkward,_ sitting here and talking to someone she knew outside the game. To make matters more awkward (for Karma, at least; Clover seems to be at ease), they _were_ good friends before, but they haven’t talked since Karma quit the gymnastics studio when she got to high school, so there’s that weird feeling of disconnect.

Floundering for something to talk about, Karma notices a horseshoe symbol by Clover’s HP bar. “Are you in a guild?”

“Yup! The Lucky Charms.” She flashes a peace sign, totally oblivious to how Karma goes completely still. “Fitting with my handle, huh? Total coincidence, though. But it’s pretty fun. Haruhi and Rie from the studio are both in it with me. Rie’s our leader. Oh, wait, you wouldn’t know her. She joined after you left. But we all logged in together, and we found some other players. Hey, you should j-”

The chair nearly topples over as Karma stands up abruptly. “Sorry,” she says, forcing what she hopes is a casual tone, “I just remembered that I have some errands to run.”

Clover looks mildly bewildered as Karma all but runs out the door. “Oh, uh, okay, bye! Don’t be a stranger!”

\---

Karma tries to take deep breaths as she paces. “What the _hell._ Oh my god, what the hell, how am I supposed to--to--god, what-”

She clutches her head with a screechy growl of frustration, about to tear her hair out. “I can’t--I can’t fight them, what if--what if I have to-”

Near hyperventilating now, she sits down hard on the ground and buries her face in her knees. Peppy, cheerful, energetic, outgoing--that’s what she remembers her friends from the studio to be like. They’re not--they can’t be-

_“They’re a small guild, only six members, but they’ve got good gear and weapons, so they’re a threat to mid-liner guilds and parties. They’ve already caused several casualties to wandering parties out on the lower floors. Be careful.”_

“Huh. And here I was, expecting a challenge.”

Shooting to her feet in a split second, she pivots with a gasp, barely drawing her sword in time to parry a vicious downward blow from a battleaxe. The force of the strike sends her skidding back a meter or two, and she automatically assumes her stance even as her heart squeezes tight at the familiar faces.

Clover takes an uncertain step forward, and the forlorn, confused expression on her face, mirrored on those of her other friend from the studio, rips Karma’s heart to pieces.

“Wait, Rue, I think we have the wrong person,” she says, blinking with wide doe eyes. “This is the one I was telling you about. I ran into her at the inn a few hours ago. That’s definitely Natsuki, right, Lucille?”

A few hours? How long was she out here, losing her mind?

The blonde on Rue’s other side chimes in, and Karma bites the inside of her cheek hard at the sound of her old friend’s voice--and the orange cursor hovering above her head. What the hell _happened?_ They fit the descriptions that Karma received from Argo, but--but how can this be true? What _happened?_

“Yeah, she used to go to our gymnastics studio,” confirms Lucille--Haruhi, rather. “There’s probably a bunch of players named Karma.”

Rue--or Rie, most likely--just shakes her head, hefting her battleaxe onto her shoulder. “Sorry. This is the one.” She casts a cool look over Karma’s avatar. “Left-handed, red cloak. Just like the rumors say.”

Normally, Karma might say something snippy about the orange player grapevine or whatever. She doesn’t have it in her right now. All she can bring herself to say is:

“I don’t want to fight my former friends. If you come quietly, we don’t have to.”

Behind Rue, she can see Clover and Lucille exchange baffled looks, and she tightens her grip on her sword. Even as her heart breaks into a million pieces, her ears pick up the sounds of other players coming to surround her from behind, and her body prepares for a fight despite her words. She’s wired for this now, conditioned to expect the worst, and frankly, she’s not sure if she likes what that says about her.

Rue shakes her head, all confidence. “Other way around, sweetheart. Look, I heard a lot of good things about you after I joined the studio, so I’ll make an exception just this once. Just drop all your gear and empty your inventory, and we’ll let you go...Natsuki, was it? We’d all rather this not be difficult.”

Karma stares levelly at her, her breathing starting to quicken. She can tell that Rue will not back down, no matter which side Clover and Lucille choose. And it might just be Karma’s pessimism talking, but she thinks she knows which side they’ll choose.

“Don’t call me that,” she whispers, tensing her muscles. _Karma_ is the one with the strength. Not _Akane Natsuki._ “My name is Karma.”

Rue’s battleaxe cleaves the air as it whistles towards Karma, who slides neatly under it on her knees and lunges, teeth bared. Clover and Lucille jump to the side with gasps as she barrels past them, and she pivots quickly to dart after Lucille, since Clover is still green and Karma doesn’t want to deal with an orange cursor. Each blow she hammers against Lucille’s sword _hurts,_ but if she can take advantage of her initial shock, she can chip down her HP quickly right off the bat.

Rue’s voice cuts angrily through the sound of clashing steel.

“Come on, Lucille, chin up! Fight back!”

That was part of their team’s chant. Karma grits her teeth and slams a roundhouse kick into Lucille’s chin, but before she can follow in with another attack, one of her other guildmates comes to defend her. This one she doesn’t know, and she launches herself into the offensive relentlessly, determined to make up for her hesitance--it’s there, no matter how much she pretends it isn’t.

She can’t think like this, she tells herself. Clover is Clover, not Kotori, the girl she used to eat popcorn with at competitions and do partner stretches with, and Lucille is Lucille, not Haruhi, the girl she used to geek out about k-dramas with and try on cute clothes with, and Karma is not Akane Natsuki, the awkward girl with few close friends, the majority of whom she’s facing down on the battlefield right now. She’s Karma, and what’s right is never easy.

She tells herself all of this over and over and over; it becomes a mantra in her head as the minutes of the fight blur together. If she doesn’t, she thinks she might hesitate, and she cannot afford to hesitate.

Her heart still breaks some more at Clover’s scream when Rue shatters to polygons. The shamrock-haired girl tears her katana from its sheath and lunges, eyes wild with anguish-

Only to jerk to a stop when Karma raises the point of her sword above the back of Lucille’s neck, forcing the other girl to her knees and keeping her in place with a gloved hand wrapped around her neck under her chin. Lucille has totally stopped fighting back, her weapon forgotten on the ground, as tears slide down her face and sink into the fabric of Karma’s glove.

Karma meets Clover’s stunned gaze evenly before sweeping her gaze over the other members of the guild, now leaderless. “Drop your weapons. Now.”

\---

_ 6/21/2023, Floor 25 (Giltstein, 1st KoB HQ) _

“Once I killed Rue and had Lucille at swordpoint, the others surrendered without much trouble,” Karma finishes quietly. Of course, she would never have the heart to kill in cold blood, no matter who it is, but they obviously didn’t know that. “They did so much killing, but when faced with losing a friend, I guess it suddenly became real.”

Karma’s seen it in front-liners too--confident, brave, bold ones who simply go into shock when a comrade shatters to polygons before their eyes. What's that saying about taking things for granted? You don't know you have it until you don't? She’s not sure how to feel about this similarity between the front-liners and orange players. It goes to show they’re all human, and it doesn’t make her job any easier.

Heathcliff simply steeples his fingers and patiently waits, silent. It’s uncanny.

“I used to go to their gymnastics studio,” she whispers, hugging her knees to her chest. “I was friends with Kotori and Haruhi--Clover and Lucille, I mean. We-” She swallows hard and squeezes her hands together--hands that she wrapped around Lucille’s windpipe and held a sword to her neck with. “We haven’t talked much since I quit the studio, but…”

“You all changed,” Heathcliff murmurs solemnly. “You changed for the better. And they didn’t.”

“I know, I know, but-” Karma breaks off, twisting one braid in her hand in agitation. “I didn’t even know Rue, but I could tell they were truly friends, and I--I hurt my friends-”

She still can’t forget Clover’s words as the ALF took them away to the Black Iron Palace prison, tied up and far from defeated.

_“You’d better stay alive, Natsuki. When the game’s over, we’ll finish this in the real world.”_

Karma didn’t say a word in response. She ignored the curious looks from the ALF players and just left, not wanting anyone to see the tears streaming down her face.

Tears well in her eyes again now, and she furiously wipes them away with the heel of her hand, sniffling. Why couldn’t this just be a normal, easy, chill mission? Oh, who is she even kidding. Not one of them has been easy so far, and she doubts they’ll ever get easy. The best she can hope for is ‘less difficult’.

“I sincerely admire you, Karma.”

She starts in surprise at Heathcliff’s words, wide-eyed. “Wh-what?”

He rests his chin on his fingers. “Many people look to these kinds of MMORPGs as a chance to reinvent themselves. To be someone they could never be in the real world, and leave that behind. Even though players may resemble their real appearances, in this world, a single sword can take you anywhere, let you become anything.” His metallic eyes gleam in the lamplight. “When confronted with your real life, though, and in such a jarring way, you still carried out your task to the end. That’s not an easy thing to do.”

Karma lets out a mirthless chuckle. “I know. I know I did a good thing by locking them up. It’s where they belong for the crimes they committed. And I still hate myself for it.”

He's quiet for a while. What is there to say, really? It'll just take some time to heal.

“Let's get some rest,” he finally says, standing up. “You'll need the energy to spend with the others tomorrow.”

A small smile tugs at her lips at the mention of her friends. Her family, more like. The thought of them brushes away some of the guilt.

“Thanks,” she says as they step into the hallway. “For what you said, I mean...It did make me feel better.”

“Good. I meant every word.”

“I know. Thank you.” Even if she has a hard time believing it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)


	7. Chapter 7

**_Fallen Star: 7/5/2023_ **

Karma closes the door behind her with a sigh as she slips into the small house that serves as KoB HQ. Her eyelids feel weighted by lead, but the glow of a job well done is enough to keep her going for another few minutes.

“Hey, _mina.”_

“Karma!”

She has enough time to muster a weary smile before Asuna cannons into her gleefully. “Oh, hey, Asuna,” she sighs, patting the other girl’s back tiredly.

“You’re back!” Godfree’s voice booms enthusiastically, and he picks both girls up in a bear hug with a hearty laugh.

If this wasn’t a safe zone, Karma thinks wryly to herself, she probably would’ve lost at least a quarter of her HP from that bear hug. She greets the others profusely, her weariness fading despite the two hours of sleep she got last night. It’s been two long weeks since she saw any of them, and although she’s slowly starting to get used to this erratic mission schedule, she always seems to underestimate how much she misses these dorks.

A guild invite pops up, and she smiles at Heathcliff as he says neutrally, _“Okaeri.”_

Having been removed from the guild for stealth purposes, she’s all too glad to hit the ‘accept’ icon. _“Tadaima,”_ she responds happily.

It’s then that she notices an unfamiliar figure sitting at the kitchen table--and the most shocking thing about her is that she’s, well, a _she,_ and she’s a teenager.

“Have you guys been recruiting?” she asks, giving the girl a friendly wave. She gets a nonplussed blink in response.

“Oh!” Asuna flits over and gently pulls the new girl over, smiling widely. “Stella-chan, this is Karma, who I was telling you about. Karma, this is Stella. We picked her up last week. She’ll be on team B with us!”

Karma extends a hand with a friendly smile. Another new member springing up out of nowhere will certainly provide some speed bumps, but her heart warms at the obvious delight Asuna shows. And they haven’t had a new girl since Asuna joined, and that was before the guild even formed officially.

“Hi, I’m Karma. I’m a co-sub-leader of team B with Asuna. I look forward to working together,” she says.

Stella smiles uncertainly, reaching out with one small, pale hand to grasp hers. “My name’s Stella,” she says in a feather-soft voice. Her slim stature, wispy hair, pale porcelain appearance, and soft countenance all paint a rather odd picture, like a painting with all the colors washed out.

“So I was gonna take her shopping this morning, just me and her, to get her fitted for a uniform,” Asuna butts in cheerfully, “but now that you’re back, we can go together!”

“What? Asuna, I don’t-”

“-need to replace your gear, blah blah blah,” her co-leader overrides her, “what _ever,_ it’ll be a nice team bonding exercise!”

Karma sighs, dragging a hand down her face. “I was going to say that I don’t have the energy to have my arm dragged out of its socket every two minutes. I was up until five in the morning today hauling orange players to prison.”

“And you accuse me of not getting enough sleep,” Heathcliff remarks very helpfully, and she glares at him indignantly.

“Okay, that’s just-”

“It’s settled! We’re going now, bye!” Asuna calls over her shoulder as she cheerfully pulls Karma and Stella out the door.

But when Stella’s shy expression turns into a small smile, Karma can’t help but smile herself.

\---

Asuna neatly folds up a casual jacket that caught her eye and grins at Stella. “Perfect! Did you get everything, Stella-chan?”

“Mmmhmm.”

“Great.” She looks at Karma pointedly. “And what are you getting?”

For the tenth time that morning, Karma sighs. “I already got this shirt at the last store we went to.” She waves it in the air for emphasis.

Her copper eyes narrow. “Why are you the way that you are?” she asks in complete exasperation.

Despite her exhaustion, Karma barks out a laugh, not offended in the least. “Maybe it has something to do with the whopping two hours of sleep I got,” she suggests sarcastically.

With a final eyeroll, Asuna flounces off to check out, and Karma mimics her eyeroll affectionately and turns to Stella. “So how are you settling in?”

“I’m fine,” she says with a timid smile, hands folded demurely in front of her.

“The guys treating you alright? They can be idiots sometimes.”

“Everyone’s very nice.”

“That’s good...Um, what do you use as a weapon?”

“A knife.”

“Huh. My starting weapon was a knife, actually.”

“Oh.”

It’s like talking to a brick wall. “Have you met Kili? He’s a knife-wielder too.”

“Yeah. He’s nice.”

Karma searches for a way to keep this awkward conversation going. “So...how did Heathcliff find you?” All the sub-leaders have recruiting privileges, but it’s typically Heathcliff who does the recruiting.

“Oh, uh, actually, Asuna-san was the one who found me,” she explains, playing with the hem of her new white and red shirt. “She saved me from a horde of monsters in the dungeon.”

“Really? That’s pretty much how I met the commander, actually.”

Stella shuffles her feet. “He’s kinda scary…”

“Heathcliff? Nah, he’s just a bit stern. He’s only scary in battle,” she reassures Stella with a wave of her hand. “Have you seen him fight yet?”

“No…”

“Well, you will soon. But really, the scariest thing about him is that he never gets enough sleep, despite what he might say.” She’s only half-joking.

“Mmm…”

The conversation dwindles, and Karma eyes her carefully.

\---

For lunch, Karma accompanies Asuna into town to go shopping for groceries. “So, about Stella…”

“Yeah?”

“How’d you guys pick her up?”

“Oh, we were hunting in a dungeon a few days ago when we saw her being surrounded, so we rushed in to help. She did pretty good in fighting them off once we pushed them back a bit, so I brought her here and invited her to the guild.” She smiles ruefully. “The commander was kinda annoyed that I didn’t ask him first, but he accepted it.”

“...Why was she in the middle of a dungeon alone?”

Asuna’s smile fades. “...I’m not sure,” she admits, sounding perplexed. “Now that I think about it, she didn’t come in with anyone else. She was alone when we found her, and she never mentioned being with a party.” She looks at Karma worriedly. “Do you think it’s something worth worrying about?”

Karma frowns to herself, trying to think. “...Maybe.”

“...What else?” Asuna prompts, as acute as ever to Karma’s thoughts.

She hesitates to put it into words. “She’s a bit...not all there, I feel like. She seems sort of detached.”

What she wants to say is that Stella seems like Karma when Heathcliff found her on Floor 1 initially--shell-shocked and dazed, amongst other things.

“Yeah, I get what you mean,” Asuna says with a sigh. “I’ve tried to get her to open up and be friends with us, but she’s really shy. I don’t know if that’s natural, or if she’s trying to push us away…”

Or if she’s hiding something, Karma adds mentally. She takes a deep breath. “Well, give it time. Maybe she _is_ just shy.”

Her instincts tell her otherwise, but she can’t think of how to approach the matter. She knows everyone’s names, she knows their weapons and skills, and given enough time, she’ll know everyone’s levels and their progression soon enough. But she’s never interacted all that personally with her troops (besides those who have been her old friends for longer than they’ve been her subordinates or colleagues); that’s Asuna’s job. Karma just directs them in battle to where they can use their skills best. Plus, Asuna was the one who first reached out to Stella. But Karma’s not sure that Asuna will know how to bring it up to Stella either.

In the end, neither of them say a word.

\---

_ 7/20/2023 _

Heathcliff’s shield deflects a roaring gout of flames from the chimera-like boss, and Karma ducks out from behind him to bring her sword down on the beast’s hind leg. It howls, and she leaps back to dodge its lashing paw as its second-to-last HP bar vanishes.

“Keep an eye out!” Heathcliff’s voice rings out throughout the boss chamber. “It’s about to change its attack pattern!”

The chimera plants its paws, snarling with drool dripping from its maw, and lashes its snake head tail. All of a sudden, acidic purple stuff sprays from the snake head, and players shriek when it corrodes both their armor and their HP.

“Shields in front!” Karma shouts instantly. “Everyone, keep an eye out for openings, but don’t-”

Asuna’s horrified cry pierces through her orders. _“Stella!”_

Karma whirls around to see the small girl running in ahead of the shield line, heedless of her orders. “No, don’t-”

At point blank range, the acid hits Stella in the face, splashing onto her white and crimson armor. With a vicious snarl, the chimera slashes three vicious gashes across her torso, sending her small, slight body flying like a broken rag doll--all within the space of a few precious seconds.

It takes Karma a moment to realize that the scream she hears is hers, and that she took off running towards the boss in a vain attempt to save Stella.

“Get down!” Heathcliff’s voice shouts as he grabs her shoulder and forces her to the ground, slamming his shield down in front of them. A ring of acid sizzles on the ground in an arc around them where it was deflected by his shield.

With a gasp, she lurches to her feet, half-blinded by the sparks that fly when the chimera’s claws strike the tower shield in front of her. An enraged cry splits the air, and Asuna comes running in a whirlwind of green light, expression stricken with grief and rage. Red pixels fly where her sword hits the boss, and Karma and Heathcliff rush in to back her up, abandoning all shreds of the shield line plan.

After the boss finally shatters into pixels, Asuna sinks to the floor with a sob, burying her face in her hands, and her rapier clatters to the floor coldly. Karma doesn’t hesitate to drop to her knees next to her co-leader, pulling her in close while she cries, gritting her teeth to withhold her own tears even as the emotions in her threaten to burst.

\---

_ 7/27/2023 _

A warm weight is huddled against Karma’s side when she wakes up, and she absently runs a hand through a sleeping Asuna’s hair with a sigh. Ever since Stella’s death a week ago, Asuna has crawled into Karma’s bed in the early mornings every night and stayed there, curled up into a tiny ball of auburn.

This isn’t the first time they’ve lost a comrade. It most certainly won’t be the last. But Karma supposes that Asuna just reached out to Stella from the get-go. Stella was the first girl who joined the guild after the two of them, and she was their age, too. And the way she died has been weighing heavily on both of them.

She hasn’t felt like this much of a total failure since Crane’s death.

Gently extricating herself from Asuna’s grasp, Karma rolls out of bed and goes to get ready. When she arrives downstairs, she finds Heathcliff sitting at the kitchen table with coffee. It’s usually him or her who’s up the earliest, and the other usually follows the first, so it’s a surprise to see that he’s not alone.

Heathcliff glances up when she stops abruptly at the base of the staircase. “Karma. Good timing.”

She blinks at the two almost identical teenage girls sitting at the table opposite the commander. “...Good morning?”

“Would you mind fetching Asuna-kun?” He gestures at the two girls, who stare at Karma silently. “They’re here to talk to the two of you about Stella.”

Karma stiffens slightly at the mention of the name. “...Yeah. Sure.”

It takes some cajoling, especially since it’s still not even seven thirty, but she eventually gets Asuna out of bed. After she comes out of the bathroom, still bleary-eyed and having no idea why Karma woke her up so early, Karma motions for her to sit down. She does so, looking even more confused, but she doesn’t protest when Karma does her hair for her.

When they arrive downstairs, Heathcliff is nowhere to be found--probably in his office. The two young girls, probably twins by their looks, look up at them, staring.

“Uh, hi,” Asuna starts off, slowly sitting down in one of the seats. “Um, who are you?”

As Karma sits down next to Asuna, one of the girls says, “I’m Lora. This is my twin sister, Ley.”

Karma and Asuna exchange looks, both as clueless as the other, but they introduce themselves anyway.

“So, why are you here?” Karma asks.

Lora and Ley exchange a glance, and Lora takes a deep breath, as if preparing to tell a story.

“We were part of a guild once,” she begins. “Just a small one of ten members. We didn’t know each other from real life, but we hit it off immediately...Stella was our guildmate too.”

Karma hears a soft gasp from Asuna.

“One day, we wandered into an anti-crystal trap in a dungeon.” Lora closes her eyes briefly, sorrow hanging on her thin shoulders. “We couldn’t teleport out, or use healing crystals, or anything. By the time all the monsters were killed, me, Ley, Stella, and Stella’s boyfriend were the only ones alive.”

“Oh my god,” Asuna whispers from behind her hands, eyes wide with horror.

“The guild disbanded after that. Ley and I, and Stella and her boyfriend, we went our separate ways. But a few days later, Stella’s boyfriend committed suicide by jumping off the edge of Aincrad,” Lora continues on quietly, and tears well in Asuna’s eyes. “When we checked our friends list, we saw that Stella had wandered into a dungeon, seemingly on her own...She was trying to get herself killed too.”

Karma’s fists clench in her lap. The parallels are sickening to think about.

“We rushed to save her, and we tried to talk her out of it, but she wouldn’t listen. She left, and that was the last we heard from her.” Lora looks up at Karma and Asuna. “When we checked our friends list again a few days later, we saw your guild emblem by her name. We were relieved that she found another guild to fight with.” Her hollow gaze slides away. “Until we checked again yesterday, and saw her name grayed out.”

Karma reaches out to rub Asuna’s back in an attempt to comfort her, even as a lump rises in her throat, and turns to Lora and Ley. “I wasn’t there, but Asuna tells me that her group found Stella by herself in another dungeon. That’s how she came to join the guild.”

“She was most likely looking to try getting herself killed again,” Lora whispers, hanging her head.

Nausea churns in Karma’s stomach. “She probably saw us as an opportunity to get close to a stronger monster, like the boss.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” Lora says softly to both of them.

Asuna hiccups loudly, using the heels of her hands to try and wipe away her falling tears. “I just--how did I not notice?” She sniffles, shoulders hunched in defeat, and Karma’s heart curls up miserably at the sight. “I was her sub-leader, I was supposed to know these things!”

Ley blinks sadly, and Lora murmurs, “Asuna-san…”

Karma swallows hard. “The thing is, I did know,” she whispers, and all three girls turn to look at her. “Deep down, I could tell something was off about her...After I lost someone early on in the game, I probably seemed much the same way.” Asuna blinks at her in surprise at this new information as she continues, “But I didn’t know what to do...When it comes to our troops that we co-lead, I typically manage battlefield orders, and Asuna oversees training. She does the things that require social interaction with our troops, and I do the rest. I couldn’t seem to connect with Stella...so I just looked the other way.”

“It’s not your fault.” Lora glances at both of them. “It’s no one’s fault. Ultimately, it was her choice to accept your help, and if she didn’t, then that can’t be put on your shoulders.”

For the first time today, Ley speaks up, with a tiny, sad smile. “We’re just glad she had someone to lean on, if she chose to. So we just wanted to make sure you knew how grateful we are, and that you don’t blame yourselves for what happened.”

\---

“...Karma?”

Lora and Ley just left. It’s just the two KoB girls sitting in the kitchen now. Heathcliff probably locked himself in his office again. Karma will go bug him soon, refill his coffee.

“Yeah?”

“Who did you lose?” Asuna whispers.

Karma lets out a long breath and takes a drink of coffee. “My boyfriend. He was a beta tester, and convinced me to log in with him. He died on the first floor.”

Asuna grasps Karma’s hand gently. “I’m so sorry…”

“Don’t be. He...Well. I don’t mean this the way it sounds, but…” She grimaces. “He did sort of have it coming. Looking back, he was a wonderful person, but he definitely had his flaws. His naivety and recklessness got him killed and almost got me killed too.” With a glance at the staircase, she murmurs, “I would’ve died that day if not for Heathcliff, Godfree, and Uzala. That’s how I met them.”

Asuna releases her hand and looks down at the table for a moment, then back up at Karma. “Do you miss him?”

She shrugs. “Not so much now...I was torn up at first, though. I really liked him. He was the only guy I’d ever dated, and at the time, it seemed like it was meant to be.” She drains the rest of her coffee and stands up to wash out the mug. “So, it probably wouldn’t have lasted. Besides, I have a job to do now, so I don’t think about him much.”

\---

_ 8/3/2023 _

“I think I’m going to step down from sub-leader.”

Heathcliff looks up at her from the new floor map. “Why?” is all he asks.

Curled up in her chair, Karma takes a deep breath. “Asuna can do everything I can. We typically alternate battlefield orders, and she’s good with strategy. Besides, I can still do that too. And she runs training pretty much by herself, and she’s--she’s better with people. Our guild is getting bigger, and I can’t deal with that while I’m tracking down player-killers. If I step down, I can devote more time to that.”

He steeples his fingers under his chin. “This wouldn’t happen to be just about Stella, would it?”

Karma carefully remains neutral. “I’ve been thinking about it for a while. Sometimes, I’ll come back from a mission only to find that my team has new members I wasn’t there to meet. I don’t know their levels, I don’t know how they fight, and they’ll rely on me to lead them into battle.”

On a more selfish, personal note, she just hates the wavering disconnect. When she’s out in the field, it’s lonely work, and she’ll wish she has someone with her, while also feeling relieved that no one else has to do this with her. When she’s with the guild, it sometimes is also lonely work when they toss around inside jokes she doesn’t get, or when new members are added--or old ones vanish.

Sometimes, she’ll come back for the boss fight, and find that someone in the guild has _died,_ and she didn’t even know. Or she’ll check her friends list while searching for a contact, and see that one of the names has grayed out. It’s a punch to the gut like nothing else, and she’ll wonder how long they’ve been dead for, even as she’s been continuing on like normal.

The first few times it happened, she would race back to headquarters immediately and mourn--in the early days, everyone they lost was still someone she knew personally. Then, as the orange guilds got more and more dangerous and active (and as she grew more and more distant from the new members), she didn’t have that luxury. She would push it to the back of her mind, until she saw the guild, and it hit her all over again. It’s whiplash, tearing her between duty and heartbreak; she doesn’t know how much longer she’ll be able to choose duty with conviction if she doesn’t cut these ties now--not all of them, just enough.

Karma clears her throat in an attempt to dislodge the cold weight in it. “Stella was...the final push. This isn’t what I should be doing.”

His gaze softens fractionally. “You’ve done well so far.” He doesn’t deny her last statement.

“I don’t know if I can in the future.”

“That’s never stopped you.”

She blinks slowly at him. “Tell me you think it would be best for me to stay on, and I’ll stay on. But I’ve talked to Asuna already, and she agrees with what I’ve said.” Unhappily, but when Karma pointed out the logic in it, she reluctantly conceded the argument. “I’ll still be part of the guild, officially or not, and I’ll always participate in important battles. But Asuna’s a natural leader, and my...skillset will be more useful if I focus on orange guilds.”

Heathcliff is silent for some time as he thinks, and Karma sits back, having made all the arguments she’s going to. She’s almost fallen asleep when he finally speaks up again.

“You’re sure?” he asks. In response, she just nods, meeting his gaze silently, and he sighs, waving away the map. “You’re aware that you will probably be around even less than you are now? I’ve tried not to send you on too many back to back missions, for the reasons that you pointed out.”

“I know. But I’ll still get to see everyone from time to time. Stopping player-killers is more important anyways,” she says firmly. “That way, we can focus more on clearing the game.”

Her commander looks at her with a shrewd expression. “When I first met you, I don’t think I would’ve expected you to become so fixated on orange players.”

“It’s not like I want to be,” she replies with a slight frown. “But I know firsthand how dangerous they are.”

“That’s true,” he agrees, brow furrowed. After another moment, he sighs again and says, “Very well. I’ll talk to the guild tomorrow. We’ll be sorry to see you go.”

So will she. “Come on, what are you talking about? It’s not like I’m leaving for good.”

He gives her a long look. “...I suppose.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, there's that. Also, Lora and Ley refers to Loreley, like the song? (Ley is pronounced like 'lie') I got the idea from Fangirl, by Rainbow Rowell. The twin protagonists are named Cather and Wren, like Catherine but split up? I thought it was cool.
> 
> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)


	8. Chapter 8

**_Burden: 8/17/2023_ **

Karma screams and thrashes against her binds, but they kick her to the ground, knocking the air out of her lungs. Her legs scrabble for purchase as she spits curses, but something cold and sharp slides into her shoulder, and her body stops obeying her orders. She slumps to the side with a gasp, a small lightning bolt icon flashing at her HP bar.

A hoarse chuckle sounds from above her. “Not so dangerous now, are you, little red?”

She snarls defiantly, but one of them yanks her head back by one of her braids, eliciting a choked grunt. “Why don’t you untie me and see how dangerous I can be?” she hisses.

“With all the casualties you already dealt us? I think not.”

They take her gear, throw her in a safe zone, and slam the doors shut. Tears leak out of her eyes at how utterly _helpless_ she is. She can barely twitch due to the paralysis. Even if she could get up, how is she supposed to get out? She clenches her fists in frustration--or tries to, at least. All that’s there are stumps of flaking red pixels, and the ‘body part loss’ debuff next to the paralysis icon.

\---

_8/21/2023_

Heathcliff looks up at the polite knock on his door. “Come in.” Well, he knows who it’s _not_ going to be.

Asuna walks in, looking uneasy about something. She salutes briefly, then says, _“Danchou,_ I’m worried about Karma.”

He tilts his head at that. “Oh?” This is the first time Asuna has expressed worry for her sister-in-arms, and given the amount of worry she typically keeps to herself, the fact that she thought it prudent to bring it up to him is...concerning.

“She hasn’t messaged me since four days ago. She typically messages me at least every other day,” the sub-leader says quietly. “I’ve been tracking her location today...She’s been in the same spot in a dungeon on one of the lower floors for the last few hours.”

That catches his attention. He knows which dungeon she’s in; he sent her there, and he projects a map of it. Asuna points at one of the few safe zones, the smallest one. “That’s it.”

He takes a deep breath. This is a dungeon on Floor 6, so it’s unlikely that she got stuck there because of the monsters. The most plausible explanation…

“I think she got captured,” Asuna whispers, completing his thought.

There’s one problem with it, though. “If so, it’s strange that they haven’t killed her. Why would they keep her alive when she poses such a threat?”

“Maybe they’re planning to use her as a hostage,” Asuna suggests grimly. “Either way, we can’t leave her there.”

He nods slowly. The most alarming thing is that she hasn’t escaped yet. Are they keeping her there using some kind of debuff?

“I agree,” he says finally. “But we can’t go about this wrong. If we act too hastily, they might decide to just kill her as soon as they know we’re coming.”

Asuna pales several shades at that, but she swallows hard, back straightening, and he’s reminded of why he chose her as a leader.

“What are you proposing, _danchou?”_

He thinks about that. “...You’re friends with that info-broker, aren’t you?”

“Argo?” She purses her lips. “I can’t say I know her well…” Her expression brightens quickly, though. “But I know someone who does.”

\---

_ 8/24/2023 _

It took some bribery, a lot of threatening, and three days too many, in everyone’s opinion, but Argo had managed to get the information that they needed. Asuna was ready to storm the dungeon by herself three days ago if she had to, but Heathcliff insisted that if their foes managed to catch Karma off guard, they’d better be cautious and get all the information they could before going in after her.

Surprisingly, Asuna’s in between with Argo, a reticent dark-haired boy named Kirito, offered his assistance. “I don’t know her well, but Karma’s a good person, and what she’s doing is important,” he explained when asked.

Heathcliff was glad to have the help, especially that of someone who is certainly less conspicuous than two of the top members of KoB. The black-clad teenager has been snooping around in the town close by the dungeon where Karma is being held, using Argo’s information to spy on some of the orange players.

“They’re buying ingredients that you’d typically use to mix poison,” he reported once. “My guess is they’re keeping her sedated with paralysis, or she would’ve broken out long ago.”

It took Argo a day to do some more digging of her own. She was the main info supplier for Karma’s initial mission, and took it upon herself to rectify the lack of information that got Karma captured in the first place, “to uphold her honor as an info-broker.” It turns out that the numbers were at least twice what they were originally thought to be, and that it wasn’t just one guild; it was two working together.

It was decided that this couldn’t be overlooked by the clearers, and not just because of Karma. A small force consisting mostly of KoB members and other trusted players was mobilized, as discreet as could be--the seriousness with which said discretion was emphasized left no doubt in everyone that ignoring that order will not bode well for any offender.

For the past two days, the raiding force has been subtly gathering in the town. Heathcliff and Asuna will infiltrate the dungeon by themselves first to maintain secrecy while still having firepower if--when needed. It’ll be inevitable for them to clash with the PK-ers at some point, so some time later, the other players will follow in behind them, occupying hopefully most of the orange players so the two infiltrating players can’t be overwhelmed. Uzala and Godfree were suitably outraged when they heard that Karma was captured. They’ll be leading the charge behind Heathcliff and Asuna.

Asuna tunes out Heathcliff as he goes over the plan one more time with her, Uzala, and Godfree, and she clenches and unclenches her hand around the handle of her rapier. All she can think about is Karma, trapped by killers in the dungeon...Her name hasn’t grayed out, so she’s still alive, but that’s only a small comfort. What have they done to her? What will they do to her if they realize rescue is on the way?

Doubt writhes in her mind, all the way to the dungeon, down into the cold stone tunnels, past ranks of unsuspecting player-killers, to the lowest floor, where Karma should be.

“This is too easy,” she whispers, mostly to herself, but Heathcliff hears her.

“I agree,” he says quietly, and she swallows hard.

His hand manipulates his menu in front of him, and she does the same. Karma’s still alive, and in the safe zone only ten, twenty meters in front of them. There are no visible obstructions, no hidden places where ambushers can leap out at them.

“We should go in assuming the worst,” he murmurs grimly.

She nods wordlessly, not trusting her voice.

When they throw open the doors, Asuna’s stomach drops out of her feet.

\---

Everything is white, and Karma’s starting to forget what else exists.

They paralyze her every time the paralysis starts to wear off, and cut off her hands every time they start to regenerate. She hasn’t been able to move since they threw her in here, crumpled in an awkward heap of amputated limbs on the white floor, looking at the same white wall because she can’t even turn her head. The numbness that she feels in her whole body from the paralysis feels like it’s starting to creep into her mind, after hearing nothing but the sounds of monsters growling through the walls for god knows how long. Her captors are too quiet; she gets no warning before they stab her with another poison knife from behind.

Every time she tries to sleep, she hears monsters. They aren’t loud, but they’re inconsistent and unpredictable. She’s been conditioned to listen for and heed their growls and groans, and it’s driven her up the walls because she can’t turn it off. And she can’t remember the last time she ate or drank anything--you can’t starve in this game, but you can feel hungry and thirsty, and she wishes she could just die already.

One day--has it been a week? A month?--she hears footsteps. She can’t turn her head, but she grunts when someone drags her upright by her braids.

“Your knights in shining armor are coming,” he croons, and she feels the kiss of cold steel against her neck. “Let’s give them a nice welcome, shall we?”

Something cuts through the numb despair. She sucks in a shuddering breath through her teeth, expressing her rage the only way she can right now, paralyzed and crippled as she is.

“I’ll kill you before you touch them…”

Her captor simply laughs, and spins her around just as the doors fly open.

\---

The room falls deathly quiet, and Karma feels sick to her stomach at the look of horror on Asuna’s face. “I’m sorry,” is all she can croak out, throat dry as a desert.

The PK-er giggles in delight, pressing the knife closer, and tiny red pixels drift up past Karma’s eyes from the shallow wound. “Well, isn’t this touching! Your guild leader himself came for you, how nice! Now drop your weapons before I cut off her head.”

The bright scarlet of their armor is sensory overload to Karma’s eyes, which have only seen white for the past _forever,_ but it triggers something in her. Her jaw clenches, and she strains to move, fighting the system for all she’s worth.

“Don’t you dare,” she spits out, and the knife digs deeper.

“Quiet!” her captor hisses, more red flakes drifting through Karma’s vision.

Her chest heaves with the effort it’s taking, and she snarls to herself, craning her neck to make eye contact with Heathcliff. Steely gray meets her gaze, and she finds it in herself to drive her boot backwards into her captor’s knee.

Instantly, the knife stabs towards her, but his aim is off. Her teeth, her only viable weapon at this point, clamp down hard on the point of the blade, and she wrenches the knife out of his surprised grip with a jerk of her head, even as a lightning-like flash of pink light erupts in her vision. The suffocating hold of her captor vanishes as he’s sent flying into the wall, and she collapses into Heathcliff’s arms.

The paralysis vanishes with the use of an antidote crystal, and another crystal brings her health back up to full and regenerates her hands. Tears of relief and shame leak from her eyes as she hides her face in his armor with a whimper, reaching around with trembling hands to gather fistfuls of his white cape; she’s almost forgotten how to use them. He lowers them both gently to the floor, setting his weapon down to hold her.

“Asuna-kun, see to the orange player and stand guard at the door,” he directs quietly. Asuna hesitates, glancing at Karma before nodding and moving to do as asked.

“I’m sorry,” Karma sobs, “I’m so sorry-”

He pulls her closer with a low hum, rubbing her back with one hand comfortingly. “You have nothing to apologize for,” he murmurs, and she cries in utter relief at the sound of his soft tenor, a promise that she’s not alone, that it’ll be okay eventually. “We’re getting you out of here. Can you stand?”

Her legs would’ve atrophied by now if this was real life; as it is, it still takes her a minute to remember how to walk after not even moving at all for…

“How long was I in here?” she rasps.

“A week.” She nearly falls to the floor again, but he catches her in time. “I apologize. We should’ve come sooner.”

“Not your fault…” She takes another shaky step. “I...I think I had given up hope already,” she admits, gritting her teeth in shame.

But there’s no condemnation in his countenance as he grips her shoulder gently. And all he asks is, “Can you fight, or do you want to teleport out?”

Suddenly, Asuna calls out, “Orange players incoming!”

Her head snaps up, her vision zeroing in on the orange cursors down the hall. “I need a sword,” she says grimly, the notion of flight not even occurring to her.

He’s already pulling one out of his inventory, handing it over to her, and she straps the sheath onto her belt and grips the handle. The simple wrapping of rough leather almost _hurts_ her hand to touch, but she draws it, focusing on the feeling of having a weapon in her hand, because a weapon shows strength.

_It doesn’t mean she feels it but maybe if she looks the part acts the part she can pretend she’s fine-_

She takes a steadier step forward and a deep breath before sprinting past a startled Asuna with a furious roar.

They thought they could break her. And they were right.

What they didn’t count on is that broken glass is sharp.

They run into the raid group halfway up, and rage floods her veins at the sight of the orange cursors attacking her guildmates and friends. She barrels into the orange players, scattering them like dominoes, and she hears a triumphant cheer go up from several familiar voices.

She grits her teeth, her throat tight, and charges into the battle like a force of nature.

\---

“You’re alive!”

Uzala practically tackles her in a hug, and every muscle in her artificial body stiffens. No one has touched her in a week, and now all at once-

Heathcliff pries the young man off of her, to her relief, and she edges closer to the commander. “Don’t smother her,” he reprimands sternly.

“Ehehe...sorry,” Uzala says with a sheepish grin, taking a step back. “I’m just really glad you’re safe.”

She knows he only means well, and she finds it in her to nod shakily. Godfree comes running up then, and she takes a step back involuntarily, even though she feels horrible about it. To his credit, though, he doesn’t immediately attempt to bear-hug her.

“Thank god you’re alive,” is all he says, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he smiles in relief, leaning on his battleaxe.

Karma jumps when she feels a small, slender hand in hers, and she turns to see Asuna smiling at her, tears trickling down the younger girl’s face.

“Seconded,” the brunette murmurs emphatically, but all Karma can think about is the touch of skin on her skin, and she pulls away, rubbing her hand and trying not to look at the hurt and worry on the younger girl’s face.

\---

_ 8/24/2023 _

“You should be sleeping,” Heathcliff says sternly as Karma slips into his office.

She curls up in her chair, clutching the edges of her cloak. “Can’t.” Asuna made dinner, which Karma ate about five helpings of, and although everyone is usually drowsy after eating her cooking, Karma just can’t relax. The bed is too soft and the room is too quiet and the sheets feel like sandpaper on her skin and everything is too much.

The fact that she threw up everything she ate for dinner just before bed probably didn’t help.

He takes a sip of coffee, which she eyes enviously, and puts down his pen. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Karma sighs, hugging her knees to her chest. “There’s not much to talk about. If you wanna know, they just paralyzed me and threw me in that room for a week.”

He narrows his eyes. “What did they do to you?” he asks quietly, but with steel in his voice.

“Nothing,” she says flatly with an indifferent shrug. “Besides repeatedly paralyzing me and cutting off my hands whenever they started to regenerate, they literally didn’t do anything. They didn’t touch me, or talk to me, or feed me, they just...left me there.” By herself, in an empty white room. She’s not sure what would’ve been worse.

She hears a quiet item SFX and looks up to see Heathcliff holding out a pair of red gloves. “Maybe these will help.”

\---

_ 9/14/2023 _

_“Danchou!”_

Heathcliff turns to see Asuna jogging up to him in the hallway, looking serious. “Can I talk to you?”

They go to the conference room nearby, which is currently empty, and Asuna leans back against the table, arms crossed nervously. She seems timid all of a sudden, so Heathcliff prompts her with, “What is it?” He thinks he knows what she’s thinking about, though, and her next words confirm his suspicions.

“It’s Karma,” she blurts out, copper eyes earnest. “She’s been hunting down orange players obsessively these days; she just goes from mission to mission without any breaks. I feel like she’s self-destructing. Could you...I don’t know…”

“Force her to take a break?” he finishes with a hint of dryness in his tone. “I’m not sure even I can do that.”

“But-”

“You are correct, though,” he continues more seriously. “Her...enthusiasm was encouraging...But I agree. It might’ve been distracting at first from what she went through, but this isn’t good for her.”

Asuna nods determinedly. “Have you gotten any updates from her?” she asks sharply.

“She said she’s close to finishing her current mission.”

“Good. Make sure she comes back to headquarters when she’s done. We’ll corner her then.” Her eyes glint. “She won’t run off this time.”

Heathcliff is often very, very glad that Karma insisted on adding Asuna to the guild.

\---

“You know,” Karma says with a note of irritation, “I’ve been doing this for almost six months now. I know a trap when I see one.”

Asuna is busy dragging her upstairs by the wrist, her grip tight and chafing, even through the gloves that Karma now wears. “And _I’ve_ been telling you for way too long that you need to take a break.”

“Asuna-”

Clearly not listening, the brunette knocks sharply; upon the commander’s reply, she pushes the door open and shoves Karma through. “I got her!”

Heathcliff looks vaguely amused from where he’s standing by the window. “I can see that.”

Karma sighs. So he’s in on this too? What is going on? She tries to ignore whatever it is they’re planning. “So where am I going next?”

“You’re staying at headquarters for at least a week,” he tells her, and she stares.

“What?”

“We’re making you take a break,” Asuna supplies helpfully.

She scowls in frustration. “I don’t need a break, what I need is to go back out there and do my job!”

Heathcliff crosses his arms coolly. “Why?”

She squints at him, bewildered. “What do you mean, why?”

“Karma, I’m running out of assignments to give you. You don’t need to push yourself so hard,” he says quietly. “And you know this as well as I do.”

Karma stares hard at him, tight-lipped, but he doesn’t waver. Her gaze slides away guiltily under the weight of his stare, and he sees her eyes flicker to Asuna as she lifts one hand to rub self-consciously at her wrist.

He sighs. “Asuna-kun, thank you for bringing her here. Please let us talk privately.”

The sub-leader’s shoulders stiffen in surprise and dismay, and she draws breath to protest. But instead, she just nods, touches Karma’s arm gently, and leaves.

“You might want to apologize to her later,” Heathcliff notes pointedly after the door closes, and Karma lets out a long sigh that betrays only a fraction of her exhaustion.

“I know,” she whispers, wringing her gloved hands together. In the brief windows of time that he’s seen her in the past few weeks, she’s always been restless, especially in her hands. He suspects it’s a byproduct of her enduring a week of forced paralysis and amputation; suddenly, she has her hands and her mobility back and doesn’t know what to do with either.

“Well?” he prompts, though not unkindly. “Are you going to explain, or should I start guessing?”

“What am I supposed to say?” she mumbles quietly. “It _is_ my job.”

He thinks back to when they first found her, held hostage with a knife to her throat, still paralyzed with two red-pixelated stumps where her hands should be.

The first thing out of her mouth was an apology.

“I could start guessing,” he says at length, walking around his desk to stand before her. “But I know already. I want to hear you say it.”

Her hands still, and she draws in a long, hissing breath through her teeth. “You and Asuna and everyone...You shouldn’t have had to come and rescue me,” she forces the unwilling words out. “It wasn’t your fight.”

Heathcliff shakes his head. “The moment they threatened one of our own, they made it our fight.”

“It wasn’t your fight,” she repeats through gritted teeth, voice trembling. “It was mine, this is _my_ job. I fight these fights so that you don’t have to. I _kill_ people so you don’t have to, and then--then-” She tangles her fingers through her hair with a helpless snarl. “And then I dragged you into it anyways! Right after I decided that stepping down and doing this was what I should be doing, and then I go and get myself in trouble and you guys have to come bail me out-”

“Karma.” His hands gently but firmly grasp her wrists, untangling her fingers from her hair; his touch is light. Their gazes meet, steely calm to a sea of torment. “If it was us in your position a few weeks ago, you wouldn’t have hesitated to storm that dungeon singlehandedly. More importantly, you can’t make our choices for us. We chose to make it our fight. It never had to be yours alone.”

He lets go of her as she contemplates his words, and she lowers her hands back down to her sides slowly. When he senses that she’s starting to get it, he gives her a figurative nudge. “I think you have something to say to Asuna-kun?”

A moment passes. Then Karma peeks up at him with the most genuine smile he’s seen from her in what feels like too long. It’s honestly barely a smile, but it’s something real.

“I think so too.” She moves towards the door, pausing with one hand on the doorknob. “I can probably fall asleep on my own tonight, so you get to sleep at a decent hour, okay?” She points a finger at him warningly. “If you don’t, I’ll know.”

He gives her a look. “I think I _almost_ missed you nagging me.”

She sticks out her tongue childishly, with her characteristic sass that he hasn’t seen in a while, before slipping out the door.

\---

Karma leans against a large oak tree and crosses her legs at the ankles lackadaisically, arms folded across her chest, a small smile curling on her lips. Asuna’s commands ring loud and clear in the forest clearing, ordering her team with shining confidence and authority. They move like a seamless machine, the various subunits switching in and out to confuse the dungeon boss.

“Kili, Nautilus, switch with Sanza and Segro!”

Kili deals one last stab with his knife before leaping back, and the boss falters at the sudden switch in attackers before lashing out. Segro deflects the attack with his small round shield, and Sanza drives his spear into the boss with a shout. The boss lets out a wail and promptly shatters, and windows pop up notifying the group of the col, experience, and items earned.

“Flawless, as usual,” Karma says with a small smile as she steps out of the treeline.

Most of the first army turn to look at her and call out greetings. Asuna does as well, but there’s a hint of uncertainty in her copper eyes. “Whatcha doing out here?” Her tone is deliberately light, and Karma feels a pang of guilt for making her leave. She would trust this girl with her life, and yet...what is it, her pride? It still insist on hiding.

“Just thought I’d make sure y’all aren’t slacking,” she teases, putting on a grin and elbowing Asuna playfully.

The other girl sniffs haughtily, her smile widening. “As _if.”_

Karma glances around the dungeon, and she realizes where they are. “Can I maybe join you guys?” Asuna’s smile brightens immediately. “Be our guest.”

As the army makes its way towards the labyrinthian section of the woods to the north, Karma falls easily into conversation with some of her older friends. She hasn’t seen them since the day she left Nolfret for the first time after her capture and rescue, which was about a month ago. Instead of returning for a day or even a few hours, she messaged Heathcliff for her new assignment details and went straight there, and she nearly forgot how much she missed them.

The tangled woods up ahead are a mess, akin to the real labyrinth from Greek legends. It changes every time the dungeon is redone. As per usual, the army splits up into pairs in order to more efficiently go through the maze. With Karma, they have even numbers, and on a silent consensus, she and Asuna walk side by side into one of the paths together.

Once the gloom of the forest has swallowed them both and they can’t hear anything or anyone, Karma says, “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” she asks, deliberately casual.

She takes a deep breath, closing her eyes briefly. What she wants to say is not what she needs to say.

“For acting like I don’t trust you,” she says softly, “when I have no reason to not trust you. And I do; honest to god, I do. You’re my best friend, and I just-” _Want to protect you,_ is what she wants to say, even though Asuna most definitely does not need protecting.

“It’s not a crime to need help,” she tells Karma solemnly, and Karma bites her lip hard.

“I know that,” she whispers. “I’m just--this life of--of running around at crazy hours and chasing down leads and--and-”

“I know you kill people,” Asuna interrupts her firmly, stopping in her tracks; Karma jerks to a stop too, and her gloves stretch over her knuckles as she clenches her fists. “I’m not naive enough to think you can convince all of them to come peacefully. That’s not how it works. I know that.”

Karma presses the heel of her hand to her temple. “But-”

“I’m not a fragile glass statue,” she continues with a hint of a steely edge in her voice, thin and cool like her rapier.

“I know you’re not!” Karma lets out a weak, humorless laugh. “But I’m not as strong as you, Asuna. That’s why I ran away from sub-leader, that’s why I couldn’t just suck it up and talk to Stella, because I saw myself in her, that’s why I do all of this _by myself,_ because-”

Her voice cuts through Karma’s spiralling words. “You’re a good person, Karma, and I don’t need you to tell me that every person you kill and every comrade we lose stays in your head for days and weeks and months after. I know they do. And you keep fighting anyways. I promise, you’re stronger than you think you are.” She lurches forward to hug Karma, who lets out a soft exhale in shock as she stands there, stock-still. “And I’ll never think any less of you for protecting yourself and other people, so don’t tell me I should think any less of you for doing what you have to do. You shouldn’t either.”

Slowly, Karma lifts her arms to return the embrace, and she takes a deep, deep breath, swallowing hard. “I’m older than you, I’m supposed to be the smart one.”

Asuna laughs quietly, pulling back with a soft smile. And even though Karma hates the bloodshed and the monsters (not all of them AIs) and the deaths, she’ll be forever grateful for the friendships and the found family she’s made along the way, and she knows she’d move heaven and earth for every single one of them, or at least try.

“We can take it in turns.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hmm. This one felt a little shaky to me...(I have no motivation to fix it though, oops XD)
> 
> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)


	9. Chapter 9

**_Bad Dreams: 9/28/2023_ **

When she checks the time, Karma barely keeps in a scream of frustration. Instead, she violently kicks her covers aside and, with a contrasting amount of caution, tiptoes out of the room, leaving Asuna sleeping peacefully in her own bed.

“Four frickin’ thirty,” she mutters to herself, beyond disgruntled as she slips downstairs, absently rubbing her wrist with one hand. “What the hell…”

Yawning widely, she stumbles her way into the kitchen and grabs the kettle, filling it up from the sink with water before setting it to boil. While waiting, she takes off her gloves, tossing them haphazardly on the counter, and splashes her face with some water before putting her gloves back on, gasping and feeling marginally more awake. Bracing her hands against the edge of the sink, she wipes her face with her sleeve and stares at her reflection in the dark window—bleary-eyed and exhausted.

“Frickin’ mess,” she mutters at herself before going to the cabinets.

The coffee is where it usually is, but even as she’s reaching for it, she spots something else—hot chocolate powder. Who bought that? She has no idea, but she switches aim and grabs that instead, fancying a sweet change. She hasn’t had it in forever, although she remembers distinctly having some last November. The warm memories, despite those chilly, blustery days, brings a small smile to her face.

While waiting for the hot chocolate to cool down, she wanders into the living room. With a flick of her finger, the side table lamp turns on, and she sits down on the couch, placing her hot chocolate on the side table and reaching for a book. It turns out that Aincrad has its own fictional lore, which they figured out from the elven war quest on a lower floor, and there are NPC stores that actually sell books about it.

She props her feet up on the coffee table and leans back against the cushions. Holding the book open with one hand, she reaches for her hot chocolate with the other, basking in the low heat of the fireplace-

Karma curses violently, nearly upending her cup. She whirls around to see Heathcliff sitting next to her on the couch and watching her with a not insignificant amount of his own brand of deadpan amusement, which does not decrease as she gapes at him, mouth opening and closing in a very good impression of a goldfish.

At last, she finds these words: “What the hell is wrong with you?! Lurking in the dark like that—you almost gave me a heart attack!”

He looks at her like she’s crazy, which she still does not appreciate despite repeated exposure, and clears his throat pointedly, as if preparing to deliver a list. “I was not _lurking in the dark._ The fire was going. And I was here first, if you didn’t realize. _You’re_ the one who nearly gave me a heart attack.” That, she highly doubts.

Karma glares. Her sleep-deprived and also still-sleepy mind can’t come up with a retort, so she glares. It is not very effective. Finally, she mutters, “Why are _you_ even awake?”

He leans back in his seat with a cup of coffee. “Looking through more paperwork,” he answers dryly, shuffling a few sheets of paper for emphasis. “I got tired of my office and thought that I might as well get some coffee while I’m at it. Since no one else _should_ be up at four thirty in the morning, I figured I wasn’t bothering anyone.” He takes a sip of coffee, eying her over the rim. “Why are _you_ awake?”

She hides her vaguely annoyed scowl in her hot chocolate. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Ah.”

They lapse into silence for a few minutes. Karma pretends to be reading but glances over at him once in a while, wondering if he’s going to say anything else. When it doesn’t look like he is, she slowly turns her focus towards the book-

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asks, just as she’s getting into the book.

“Talk about what,” she grumbles, blinking tiredly and rubbing her eyes while trying to focus on the book. Apparently, sleep deprivation has effects in game too.

“The nightmares you’ve been having.”

Karma looks sharply at him, and he just smiles wryly. “I admit, I wasn’t being totally honest. I came down here to see if I could get some work done and catch you in the meantime.”

Her stomach slowly started twisting itself into knots at the mention of her nightmares, and her hands tingle, like pins and needles. “How did you even know? I usually get up before you, so it’s not like that’s weird or-”

“You’re talking to someone whom you yourself constantly chastise for not getting enough sleep,” he interrupts flatly. “And your accusations aren’t unfounded, so trust me—you’re looking at the expert here.” He taps his papers with his pen. “And I know you haven’t got all of this to worry about, so I made an educated guess. Do you want to talk about it?”

Half irritated she was seen through so easily and half too exhausted to care or protest, she shrugs, no longer interested in the book. “Oh, just the usual. Dead people. Dead faces. All yelling obscenities at me. It’s sad that I don’t know most of their names. Some of them don’t even _have_ faces. I mean, heh, is my memory that bad? Really…”

She takes a large gulp of hot chocolate, not caring about how it burns her tongue and throat on the way down. “Usually ends with them killing someone. Me, sometimes. Funny feeling, waking up only to realize there’s _not_ in fact a sword sticking out of your chest, or that you _haven’t_ been chopped in half by a ginormous axe...Yesterday, it was Asuna. Today was you.”

Her voice wobbles, and she hears a quiet sigh. When he murmurs, “Come here,” arm held out, she hesitates only a moment before cuddling up to his side under his arm like a lonely puppy and resting her head on his broad shoulder, cradling her hot chocolate carefully in both hands. She didn’t even realize her breathing quickened until it begins to slow again, and she takes deep breaths, closing her eyes.

He rustles one of his papers quietly. “What do you think?”

Karma yawns and blinks down at it sleepily. As she scans its contents, she scrunches up her nose and curls up tighter. “Tell them to piss off.”

He snorts, a puff of warm air drifting over her head. “I can’t just tell them to piss off.”

“Then politely tell them to piss off,” she mumbles. “They can figure it out themselves.”

“I fear what would happen if I let you run the guild…”

“You should. We’d get so much more done.”

With a roll of his eyes, Heathcliff takes her hot chocolate before her sleepy hands spill it and puts it on the coffee table, ignoring her half-hearted mewls of protest. He placates her with a pat on the head before returning to work.

“Oh, look, that one’s for me,” sighs a ninety percent asleep Karma, who’s staring at the letter in his hands with heavy-lidded eyes. “Seems serious.”

He hums absently, staring down at the letter. “When do you want to leave?”

“Mmm...boss fight’s in two days. The day after that should be okay.”

“Very well...Make sure to get some decent rest before the fight.”

“Hypocrite.”

For the next two to three hours, Karma drifts in and out of consciousness while Heathcliff works. Occasionally, she’ll chip in with a sleepy, smart comment when he thinks she’s asleep.

“Tell them to get their own crafters.”

“None of their damn business.”

“Frickin’ DDA.”

“Noobs.”

It’s not until the first traces of red seep into the sky that she mumbles, “‘M sorry.”

He sighs, absently tossing another letter onto the coffee table and finishing off his drink. “Don’t be.”

She continues anyway, “I’m sorry for making you take care of me.”

“You didn’t make me.” He squeezes her shoulders gently; his tone is impassive, his actions warm. “I told you. I’m here whenever you need me—whether you ask for it or not.”

She makes a small whine of protest, and he adds, “Just repaying the favor, mind you. You do the same all the time— _especially_ when I _don’t_ ask for it.”

Slowly, he can feel the tension bleed out of her wiry frame, and he rubs her shoulder absently. With a catlike yawn, she mumbles, “My hot chocolate…”

“...I think I finished it.”

“You’re evil.”

“You can make some more later.”

A sigh. “Maybe. But I didn’t buy it, so.”

“No. I did.”

He feels her shift her head to give him an incredulous look. “You like sweet stuff?”

“No,” he denies, maybe a little too quickly, refusing to look her in the eye. “But I know you do sometimes.”

A small chuckle emanates from her curled up form. “Lie.”

“Half-truth,” he counters, and she hums sleepily in acceptance.

\---

_** Giving Up: 10/20/2023 ** _

Karma stands in front of the wooden door. Her foot taps the floor anxiously as she bites the inside of her cheek.

_“He resigned?!”_

_Asuna folded her arms under her chest, averting her gaze. “From what I understand, he has a condition called FullDive Non-Conformity. His brain overrides the NerveGear and forces him to stay away from lethal situations. I had to sideline him for this boss fight because of it, and I was going to talk to him after, see if we could fix it…”_

_Godfree took over, his expression unusually solemn. “On the day of the boss fight, there was a party who needed help down on a lower floor. He and an old friend of his gathered reinforcements and went to help. His friend was the only casualty.”_

It took some digging around to track Nautilus down. He deleted himself off of everyone’s friend list, so they couldn’t track him that way. Still, compared to finding orange players who actively tried to erase their tracks, Karma didn’t have too hard of a time finding one grieving former Knight.

What is she supposed to say? How is she supposed to make this any better? Can she even convince him to come back?

Should she?

He almost got Sanza killed. Not willfully, but if he can’t figure out a solution to his FNC, he’d only be a liability in a fight.

No matter, she decides, lifting her hand. Regardless of whether or not she can or should convince him to rejoin the guild, she can’t leave him to grieve alone.

She raps lightly on the door. “Nautilus? It’s me, Karma. Can I come in?”

She waits a minute. Then two minutes. Five minutes. Ten. Her hand falls to the worn doorknob, and she takes a deep breath, leaning her forearms on the doorknob. The silence makes her heart ache, in more ways than one and for more reasons than one.

_Karma rapped lightly on the door and waited. After Heathcliff talked to her last night and told her that her comrades had spoken highly of her, she figured the least she could do was check in on the other members of her party._

_A second later, a hesitant voice said, “Um, come in?”_

_She opened the door and offered a small smile to the young man perched on the edge of his bed, seemingly deep in thought. “Hey. Just checking in on everyone.”_

_His head hung in defeat, hands knit tightly in his lap. “You don’t need to pretend,” he muttered, avoiding eye contact. “Are you guys kicking me out?”_

_Karma closed the door behind her and wandered over to sit down in the chair. “No, of course not. We just got you last week.”_

_Nautilus looked up then, face drawn with anguish and misery. “I got Crane killed.”_

_A lump rose in her throat, but she kept her voice even. “That’s not true.”_

_His breathing hitched, and his hands clenched tightly on his knees. “If I hadn’t slipped-”_

_“That was a mistake any of us could’ve made at any time that night,” she told him calmly, trying to channel Heathcliff. “It was difficult terrain all the way through. It was just bad luck.”_

_Nautilus hunched his shoulders. “He still died because of me. None of you guys would’ve slipped up like that-”_

_“It was bad luck,” she repeated firmly, wracking her brain for something to say, anything that might be able to make him feel better. “You wanna know a secret?”_

_Despite his grief, he glanced up. “What?”_

_“I was flying by the seat of my pants that whole night,” she said bluntly. “I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.”_

_His brow furrowed in confusion. “But you told us Crane showed you how to get around the river-”_

_“I lied to your faces,” she informed him matter-of-factly. “Thought it might make you all feel better. What I’m trying to say is, it could’ve been any of us, at any point. What happened, happened. It wasn’t your fault. Please don’t feel like it was.” It was cruel that it happened when the end was so close in sight. But that was how life went, wasn’t it?_

_“And,” she added softly, “I’m sad that it was Crane. But I’m also glad that it wasn’t any of you, and that it wasn’t more.”_

_Nautilus let out a long breath, shifting slightly. He leaned back suddenly, bracing his hands behind him, and Karma was beyond relieved to see a weak smile on his face._

_“You should try flying by the seat of your pants more often, ‘cause it works,” he told her, raising his eyebrows briefly for emphasis. “And thanks for the encouragement. For what it’s worth, I’m glad you were our leader that night.”_

It feels like so long ago, when they weren’t even really a guild and Karma still spent time with them 24/7. Things changed so fast...And Karma couldn’t quite keep up. The decision she made after Stella died was the right one, in her opinion. But it still feels like she was just running away.

Again, Karma takes a deep breath and knocks on the door. “Nautilus. Please, I just want to talk to you. Not as your former leader or guildmate, just as a friend. It’s not good to be alone like this.

“I know losing her is hard. We’ve all experienced loss before.” Her fist clenches against the wooden surface of the door. “It doesn’t make it any better or any easier, but you’re never alone. We’ve all lost family here, whether it’s family we came here with or family we made along the way. But you haven’t lost everything. I know it feels like it, I _know._ But we’re here for you.”

She tries a few more times. Still no dice. Then she waits downstairs for a couple hours, sipping cheap coffee, just in case he went out, although it seems unlikely. When it gets late and she hasn’t seen a trace of him, she goes back upstairs and is about to knock again when she hears something miserable and broken that sounds like it’s being muffled in a pillow.

Her knuckles come to rest silently on the wood, and her hand unfurls, her palm lying flat against the door.

She hasn’t had to report many downright failures to Heathcliff. And this one hurts.

\---

_** Paying Respects: 11/11/2023 ** _

Karma draws a few strange looks as she makes her way towards the Black Iron Palace. This time, her business here is significantly different than her normal, which is dragging orange players to prison.

Despite her constant visits, she only knows a handful of ALF members by name and face, but lots of them know her by reputation. The KoB cross by her name helps. Heathcliff added her back to the roster for the boss fight. She gets several curious, occasionally suspicious looks but no opposition.

Karma runs into a familiar face in the halls. “Hi, Yulier.”

The silver-haired woman looks worn-out, as usual, but she’s as polite as ever. “Karma. What are you doing here? Isn’t the boss fight today?”

“It is. I just wanted to pay the monument a visit.”

Understanding softens Yulier’s expression. “Ah. Well, good luck at the fight.”

She nods in acknowledgement, and they part ways. The path Karma travels is one that likely every SAO player has taken at least once in their time here or will take at least once by the end of the game—old or young, front-liner or non-combatant.

The black steel double doors open with a heavy groan, and faded sunlight pours in from the open ceiling and the many windows lined up like those of a cathedral. Despite the vast emptiness of the chamber, her footsteps are muffled by her soft leather boots as she steadily approaches the stone dais and the huge, rectangular, shiny piece of jet black iron.

She pauses at the top of the steps and takes a moment to look back and forth at the Monument of Life, and the ten thousand names neatly scribed upon it. By lucky chance, her own name is at eye level, and she spares it a lingering glance before searching for a specific name.

Finally, she finds what—or _who_ —she’s looking for. Even through her gloves, she can feel the indentations in the steel, and she runs a light finger along the line impassively scoring through the name, chewing absently on her lip.

“You wouldn’t believe what I’ve been doing lately,” she finally sighs, letting her hand drop back to her side. “I wonder what would’ve happened if you didn’t die. For all I know, it might’ve been you on the front lines right now. But I doubt you’d be doing what I am now.” He wouldn’t have had the stomach for it.

She contemplates the name before her, silently mourning the loss of a soul that didn’t deserve such a harsh end. His bloodcurdling screams, cut off abruptly by the death SFX like a guillotine slamming down, haunted her for a good while after it happened.

Her gaze and attention wanders, predictably, and she wanders slowly up and down the monument, hands linked behind her. With each name of an old comrade that she reads, scored through, her heart twinges in a way that it never did for him. Maybe it’s because they never fought side by side in the few days they were in here together—it was always him doing the fighting, protecting her.

The doors open again. She glances back to see a familiar, broad-shouldered silhouette standing in the threshold, dressed in full armor. A surprised glance down at her watch reveals that the boss raid begins in five minutes.

“Oops,” she says with a contrite grin as she leaps down from the dais, jogging lightly over to Heathcliff, who crosses his arms with a raised eyebrow. “Got distracted.”

“Here I was, thinking you were dealing with some orange player trouble at the last minute,” he remarks as they turn to leave. “Then I ran into someone who told me you were at the monument.”

“Just paying my respects.” A mirthless smile quirks at her lips. “We’ve been in here long enough that one-year death anniversaries are actually a thing.” Her voice is a little sharper than she intended, but he doesn’t seem to notice or care.

They step out into the sunlight, and he glances at her briefly as they start towards the main plaza, where the teleport gate is. “It’s also been a year-”

“-since we met,” she finishes with a nod and another smile, this one nostalgic. “Never a dull moment since.” In the worst and the best ways.

He climbs onto the teleport gate and turns to face her as she does the same, and she can see a hint of humor on his expression. “Indeed.”

Asuna greets them at the gate of Floor 42’s main settlement. “Cutting it a bit close, huh?” she snarks, placing her hands on her hips.

Karma has enough time to chuckle sheepishly before Heathcliff gathers the clearers’ attention and directs everyone to move out. At a jerk of his head, Karma and Asuna join him, Uzala, and Godfree at the head of the group, and Karma lets her hand rest lightly on the hilt of her sword.

So much has happened. As she said before, never a dull moment since. If the past her met the current her, would the two even recognize each other? _Maybe_ they would see each other as being the same person, but off the top of her head, Karma can’t think of anyone more radically different from herself than who she was before.

She envies and pities her past self, and if her past self knew what she’d be getting into, she would’ve envied and pitied her current self. Everything was simple back then, compared to now. Even after the death game was announced, all she did was let her boyfriend guide her. All she had to do was follow.

Well, to be fair, she still does a good deal of that. But it’s not out of ignorance and lack of power like it was before, in her opinion. And it’s not because she needs to be protected.

With Heathcliff’s morale-boosting words lingering in the minds of the clearers, he and Karma turn to the boss room, placing a hand each on the doors.

This is her fight now too. She wouldn’t have it any other way.

\---

_** Everything: 12/19/2023 ** _

White puffs of condensation appear in front of Karma as she steps out of the Black Iron Palace and shivers. Winters are scarily realistic, even in a video game.

She pulls up her messages and sighs. As a favor for information, Argo wanted her to run some errands while in the Town of Beginnings, and she quickly gets on that, if only to get out of the cold soon.

An hour or two later, she’s glad to check off the last task on Argo’s (extensive) list, and she absently lifts a hand to brush off the snow on her hood. Now, for the long trip back to the teleport gate through the maze-like city, the most daunting task of all…

She sighs.

_Sniff._

Her head lifts slightly at the sound, and she turns, frowning.

_Sniff._

Curious and wary (more out of habit than anything), she wanders down the street in the direction of the sound. It sounds like…

She rounds a corner and stops short, her hand dropping from the handle of her sword.

A small child sits at the base of a lamppost, sniffling and crying into fluffy mittens. The first thing she thinks of is whether or not this is a trap—and then she kicks herself hard and walks over to the child, berating herself for being so paranoid. Honestly, what’s wrong with her these days?

“Hey, are you okay?” she asks gently, kneeling down in front of him. He’s younger than Kota—probably five or six. Again, who thought it would be a good idea to let grade school age kids play a VRMMORPG like this?

He looks up at her with big, watery eyes, hiccupping. “I-I don’t know where they went…”

“Your friends?”

He nods, sniffling loudly, and she hums to herself. “Do you have any of them on your friends list?” she asks, hoping for an easy way out.

When he stares at her uncomprehendingly, she sighs. “Okay, maybe not…Who are your ‘friends’, exactly?”

“U-um…W-well, there’s Henry, and Clair, and Oscar...and Miss Sasha…”

Karma blinks. Miss Sasha...That rings a bell. “Miss Sasha?”

“Uh-huh. She takes care of all of us.”

Argo did mention something about that—how there’s a daycare shelter in the Town of Beginnings, funded by some mid-liner guilds that Argo has connections with. This is probably what she was talking about.

“Let’s go back to the main plaza,” she suggests, standing up. “I think I know someone who can tell us where your friends are.”

\---

Karma smiles when the young boy runs to a young woman standing in front of the church. After Argo sent her directions, it wasn’t too hard to get there.

A few other kids come running out of the daycare too, and the young woman nudges the boy to go with them. He does so gladly, and she straightens up with a relieved smile at Karma.

“Thank you so much for finding him,” she says gratefully, looking frazzled but relieved. “I’m sorry for any trouble.”

“Don’t worry about it. You might want to add him to your friends list sometime, though.”

Sasha nods in agreement. “I know. He’s been with us for only a few days, and I just got caught up in making preparations for a Christmas party for the kids…Would you like to come in for some tea?”

“Sounds great, thanks,” she says wholeheartedly, looking forward to having some feeling return to her frozen fingers.

The kids swarm her when she comes in, but Sasha seems to have them under control, which Karma admires. Wrangling kids seems like a full-time job.

“Woah, you’re from the Knights of the Blood Oath!”

She blinks, eyes flickering involuntarily up to her HP bar, where the cross is displayed in her vision. “Oh, yeah.” They didn’t see the need to take her off the roster for this one.

The kids ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’. “So you fight on the front lines against the bosses and stuff!” one of them exclaims, making mock swipes and jabs with an imaginary sword.

“So cool!”

“You must be, like, super strong!”

Sasha clears her throat pointedly. “What did I just say about not smothering our guest?”

Karma stifles a grin at the contrite looks on their faces as they mumble, “Sorry, Miss Sasha.”

They disperse to go play, although Karma sees some of them working on Christmas decorations. “I’m glad this place exists for them.”

Sasha smiles a bit sadly. “We all have to do our best. Oh, speaking of, I should probably let Kota know that they don’t have to keep looking…”

Karma does a double take at the name. “Kota?” she echoes, trying to force a casual tone. No way…

Sasha doesn’t miss it, though. She pauses in typing out a message and looks at her curiously. “Do you know him?”

“Maybe...What does he look like?” What if it _is_ the same boy?

“Um, he’s about ten. Short black hair. Blue eyes.” A smile tugs at her lips. “He calls me ‘onee-san’.”

She takes a deep breath. “...I’m glad he found somewhere to go...How did you find him?”

“A friend sent him to me. She found him wandering around by himself on one of the upper floors and suggested that he come here.”

Karma despises herself for thinking it, but she has to wonder briefly if it’s possible that the boy still has connections to orange players. But then again, what purpose would orange players have by targeting children? Using them as hostages? It would be hard to get their hands on the children here, with or without Kota’s help…But they would make pretty effective hostages if captured.

“How’s he doing?” she finally asks, trying to brush aside that gruesome train of thought.

Sasha’s brow furrows slightly. “He’s a quiet kid. Pretty resourceful. I guess that’s from his time on the upper floors. Overall, he’s pretty helpful. He runs errands for me, and he teaches the younger ones to defend themselves sometimes, but he’s not very sociable otherwise.”

Unsurprising. He lived so long in a world hardly meant for children.

Suddenly, the doors open again, bringing in a cold gust and a brief flurry of snow before they shut.

“We’re back, Miss Sasha! We got all the things!”

“Wonderful, thank you. If you guys want to make yourself some hot chocolate, there’s water boiling in the kitchen.”

Two of the three children, all of them older, cheer and dash off. The other one looks around the room, and his gaze lands on the boy that Karma found earlier, as if confirming for himself that he’s safe.

Then he sees Karma.

She stares back at Kota, unsure of what to think or do. Hesitantly, she smiles at him, but he seems rooted to the spot with terror, which twists her heart painfully. Clearly, he remembers.

Sasha glances back and forth between them, a look of mild suspicion flickering across her face. “How exactly did you two meet, again?”

Karma’s gaze flicks to Kota again, who seems stricken with fear. He’s genuinely terrified of what she’s going to say.

“I found him surrounded by monsters in the field, so I stepped in,” she explains, offering her best warm smile. “A friend of his found him in the town nearby, so we parted ways there.”

His shoulders slump as he breathes out a shaky sigh of relief, some of the tension bleeding out of his small frame. “H-hi,” he stammers, ducking into a quick bow, and he darts an apprehensive glance in Sasha’s direction as he straightens up.

Karma coughs softly. “Do you mind if I talk to you for a second?”

He doesn’t refuse, although she would’ve left him alone if he did. They sit down at a table away from some of the other children. He sits on the edge of his seat, the heat counters of his hot chocolate ticking down as it goes untouched. He’s clearly poised to run at the first sign of danger, and a fist squeezes around her heart again as she tries to figure out what to say.

“Do you like it here?” she finally asks.

His gaze darts up to hers briefly before dropping again. “Y-yeah.” This is so unlike the cheerful, exuberant boy she bought ice cream for. But she didn’t know him then either.

“Good,” she mumbles, still at somewhat of a loss.

“Are you going to make me leave?” Kota blurts out, voice cracking, along with something in her chest.

She cups her gloved hands around her own mug. “No. Of course not.”

His shoulders tremble, and she resists the urge to reach over to comfort him, knowing it wouldn’t go over well. “I tried to kill you.”

“Did you want to?”

“No,” he whimpers, head bowed, and she bites the inside of her cheek, hard. “B-but I still tried. And I h-helped them k-kill so many people. Don’t you hate me?”

“‘Hate’ is a strong word,” she notes dryly. “And no, I don’t hate you. You’re, like, ten.”

“Eleven,” he mutters.

A hint of a smile flickers on her face. “Eleven. You lost everything, and you did what you had to in order to survive...I got some answers out of that orange player. After your sister died, you didn’t have anyone else you knew you could rely on. And that’s not your fault.”

He doesn’t look up, shoulders still hunched, and she sighs. She wondered then, too, whether or not it would be a good idea to tell him what’s happened to her. She didn’t at that time. Maybe now is a good time.

“I was lucky,” she starts, shifting slightly. “I lost everything I could rely on...And then moments later, I found what would become my everything.” She lifts her cup to take a sip, warmth coiling in her chest at the memories. “If it were me in your position, I don’t think I could’ve done anything different. So I don’t blame you for the path you had to choose. I’m alive, and those orange players are behind bars. And now you have a really good home with good people.”

Slowly, he turns his gaze upward to look at her, eyes bright with unshed tears. She smiles, and dares to tell him, “It’s okay.”

She ends up spending a good chunk of her day with the kids, helping them decorate the church. When she leaves, some of them wave goodbye. Kota is one of them, clearly surprising some of the other kids and Sasha.

Heathcliff looks up as she walks in. “I thought you said you’d finished up this morning.”

“Argo wanted me to run some errands, and then I ran into some kids from a daycare shelter.” A smile curls at her lips as she sits down. “Kids really are the best of us sometimes.”

“What do you mean?”

“They still care enough to try for redemption.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel bad for Nautilus...
> 
> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment and let me know what you think! :)


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> READ THIS PLEASE:
> 
> So, I probably shouldn't be saying this as a writer, but you can probably just ignore this chapter. This is just my personal headcanon that Heathcliff's handle comes from the book Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte and the character named Heathcliff. There'll be a lot of spoilers for the book in this chapter, which is mainly just my confused thoughts on the book combined with Sparknotes XD You can skip from "What did you think?" to "The passion in his voice was evident." (or just where I marked 'cue spoilers' to 'end spoilers'). I'm gonna bring the book up a few times in future chapters, and while you don't necessarily need to read this chapter or the book to understand the story, you should still read the book :) It's super good.

**_Good Literature: 11/21/2023_ **

**__**_“Ne,_ Heathcliff.”

He looks up. “Hmm?”

The moon has risen high in the starry sky in the window. It’s almost midnight. Karma has her bare feet propped up on his desk, hands tucked behind her head of loose, bristling hair. She just finished debriefing him on her last mission that she finished earlier today.

“Where does your handle come from? If you don’t mind me asking.”

Heathcliff blinks at the question, seemingly surprised. “A book. _Wuthering Heights,_ by Emily Bronte _._ It’s an English novel, written in 1847. One of the characters is called Heathcliff.”

She tilts her head in interest. “Oh. Cool. What’s it about?”

With a sigh, he waves away his menu, apparently done with work for the night. “It’s a gothic romance novel. Not your typical one, though. Instead of me explaining…”

He leans back to pluck a book off the shelf behind him with cool accuracy, handing it to her. “Here. It’s a Japanese translation.”

Intrigued, she puts her feet down and leans forward to take it. “Huh.” She runs her thumb along the simple cover and its gold lettering, shining in the lamplight; she can feel the indented characters through the thin fabric of her gloves.

His metallic eyes gleam--his equivalent of a mysterious smile. “Let me know what you think.”

\---

The next night, Asuna comes out of the shower to see Karma reading in bed. “What’s that?”

“Hmm? Oh, it’s a book that Heathcliff lent me.”

“Really? A book? What’s it about?”

“I have no idea,” she admits. “There’s no blurb, and I just started it. He told me it was a gothic romance.”

Asuna snorts out a laugh. “The commander reads gothic romance?”

“I guess so,” she says with a shrug and a grin.

“Well, to each their own. Why’d he lend you a book?”

“Apparently, he got his handle from one of the characters in it.”

Her copper gaze lights up with interest. “Really? Now I wanna read it.”

Karma smiles, scooting over and patting the bed beside her. “Here. We can read it together. Or I can read out loud.”

The brunette beams at that and scurries under the covers next to Karma. “Can you read out loud?”

She smiles, shifting the book so that it sits in both their laps. Asuna is warm and soft, and her hair smells flowery, like their shampoo. “Sure. I’ll just start from the beginning. _‘1801--I have just returned from a visit to my landlord--the solitary neighbor that I shall be troubled with…’”_

\---

 _“‘Before I came to live here, she commenced--waiting no further invitation to her story--I was almost always’--_ hang on, so Nelly is telling Lockwood a story,” Karma interrupts herself, frowning at the strange narration style.

“Seems like it,” Asuna agrees. “Might be a nice change of pace. This Lockwood guy seems kind of boring.”

“Mmm. So everything onward is from her point of view?”

“I guess so.”

\---

 _“‘But Mr. Lockwood, I forget these tales cannot divert you--_ okay, so basically, everything we just read was pretty much a story that Nelly’s telling him,” Karma says, frowning at the strange break in the story.

“Like she’s just talking to him,” Asuna supplies. “Funny that she throws in all those lines, though. She can’t actually remember them, right? This had to have happened way earlier.”

“No, I doubt she actually remembers. She’s probably just recreating them from memory.” Something that Megu, a literature nerd, used to say pops into Karma’s head. “I guess she’s kind of an unreliable narrator. Is that what that means? We should probably take everything she says with a grain of salt. Oh, look, she says here, _‘I could have told Heathcliff’s history, all that you need hear, in half a dozen words.’”_

The brunette scoffs at that. “Totally biased.”

“Mmm.”

“I don’t get why the leader chose Heathcliff, though,” Asuna says, wrinkling her nose slightly in confusion, as Karma closes the book for the night. “I mean, Nelly obviously was never that fond of him, but he acts sort of like a heathen.”

Karma regards the book thoughtfully. “Yeah, it does seem that way...It’s a bit early to judge, though.”

The next day, though, Heathcliff--the real one--tells Karma that she has another mission, to her disappointment. She was looking forward to a relaxing few days at home, maybe going out with the guys to grind experience or quest for items. Asuna reassures Karma that she should go ahead and keep reading, and just fill her in via messaging along the way.

\---

A whirlwind of red and black bursts into Heathcliff’s office. “Hey, I finished it!”

He looks up, mildly raising an eyebrow in surprise at her abrupt entrance as she plops down in the chair. “That was fast.” It’s only been three days since she left.

Also, she’s grinning, which is strange. There’s sometimes an expression of satisfaction after a smooth job, which is far and few in between in itself, but she never looks so cheerful.

“I know!” she gushes, placing her gloved hands flat on the table and leaning in, eyes wide and merry. “I’ve never read a book that fast, but I couldn’t stop!”

He does a double take. “What?”

She materializes the book in her hands and drops it on the desk, right on top of his paperwork, beaming giddily. “And I finished it on the second night! So I knew I just _had_ to get back and talk to you about it, so I hit the gas on the mission and finished it up the next day!” Forestalling his concern, she adds, “Don’t worry, it’s not like I rushed it. I even double checked. All orange players were accounted for, and all of them are sitting in jail. It’s like the stars aligned for once! Some of them even surrendered at the mere sight of my terrifying face. Now can we talk about the book?!”

She sounds like a child who was promised video game time in exchange for chores, and she looks like one too--practically vibrating in her seat with excitement, bright-eyed and eager. He pushes the book off of his paperwork with a sigh, concluding that he’s going to get no work done today. Honestly, though, that’s okay with him. Just this once.

“What did you think?”

**(cue spoilers)**

“A lot of it was confusing,” she says immediately, but she sounds more fascinated than confused. “The narration, for one. I know Nelly was narrating most of it, but she told a lot of it through things that other people said, and at one point, there was a whole chapter where Nelly was talking about something that happened that she wasn’t even there for, so Nelly was telling Lockwood _about_ how Isabella told her something, while Isabella was quoting things that other people said...The quotation marks didn’t clear things up either. Oh, and I could hardly tell what Joseph was saying most of the time, so…”

He nods in agreement. “That does tend to be the case. What did you think of Lockwood and his introduction?”

She wrinkles her nose. “It was confusing,” she repeats. “He didn’t know anything about the family, so he was going in blind, so _we_ were going in blind as the readers, and then he made all these assumptions about them and I was thinking, ‘oh, okay’ and then they say ‘no, you’re an idiot’, and I’m sitting here like, ‘what’s going on, and what’s true and what’s not?’”

Heathcliff stifles a chuckle at her haphazard retelling of her reading experience. “Right. It’s something you figure out along the way.”

“Can you, like, draw me a family tree? Please?”

He huffs in amusement and grabs his pen again, inwardly glad to be using it for something other than administrative paperwork. As he sketches out a diagram, he talks her through it. “So first, you have the older Earnshaws. They’re in the same generation as the older Lintons. The older Earnshaws’ children are Hindley and the first Catherine.”

“Why are there so many repeats anyways?” Karma mutters crossly, propping her head up on one hand.

“Storytelling purposes. So the first Earnshaws also adopt the main character Heathcliff, so he’s like an adopted sibling, although only in name.” It feels a little strange to be talking about someone with the same name that people have been referring to him as for the past year. He’s never had a chance to talk to someone else about the book. “As for the Lintons, there are the older Lintons, whose children are Isabella and Edgar Linton. Isabella, Edgar, Hindley, the first Catherine, and Heathcliff are all in the same generation.

“Hindley gets married to another girl--she’s not important. They have a child named Hareton Earnshaw--luckily, there’s only one Hareton that’s relevant in the story--and the mother soon dies. Catherine gets married to Edgar, and they have a daughter that’s also named Catherine.” He notices Karma’s peeved expression and adds, “We’ll just refer to her as Cathy. Heathcliff and Isabella get married and have a son, whom Isabella names Linton. Don’t ask me why. And then Linton and Cathy later get married, although Linton dies a few days later, and at the end of the book, Cathy and Hareton are engaged.”

“Aren’t Linton and Cathy and Hareton all cousins?” Karma finally asks. “By blood?”

“Yes. Yes, they are.”

“...Okay,” is all she says to that. “And then Cathy and Hareton getting engaged, and Heathcliff dying, both happen after Lockwood leaves the first time, but before Lockwood visits a second time, right? So the book isn’t entirely a retelling of the past.”

“Right.” He steeples his fingers on top of the book, fiddling with the little ribbon that Karma apparently used as a bookmark. “So how many of the symbols and motifs did you get?”

“Not many,” she admits unabashedly. “I was sorta busy trying to figure out the family tree and the five hundred Catherines running around.” She grins when he rolls his eyes, and she continues, “I guess we can talk about repetition. As I said, five hundred Catherines.”

He tips his head to the side with a brief shrug of acknowledgement. Especially in the beginning, when Lockwood was reading the names of the three Catherines, they got sort of confusing. “And?”

“And the events overall, I suppose.” She props her elbows up on the desk and cradles her chin in the heels of her palms. “Hindley mistreating Heathcliff in the first generation was like how Heathcliff mistreats Hareton in the second. And in a more broad sense, the two families just keep clashing and hurting each other. Even with the two first-generation marriages, they were still definitely two different families. By the end of it, though, with Cathy and Hareton getting together, they’re basically one family.” She pauses. “Mostly because everyone else is dead by that point.”

He nods slowly. “What do you think about nature versus nurture?” She tilts her head in slight confusion. “Nature versus nurture? Um, isn’t that, like, genes versus upbringing? Which has a bigger impact?”

“No. Well, yes, but not really in this context.” He spins the family tree sketch around and taps the Earnshaw tree. “We’re talking about nature, as in one’s inner nature, represented by the Earnshaws. You see it more in Catherine and Heathcliff than Hindley, but he shows it too. They all easily give in to their desires without much thought for the long-term consequences, which can make them bold and strong, as Cathy shows several times, but can also make them brazen and careless for others, as Catherine and Heathcliff both show.”

He moves his pen to tap the Linton side of the tree. “Meanwhile, the Lintons represent nurture. The Lintons brought up their children to be demure and refined. They think before they act and are more conventional, but as you saw, that was also their downfall--in Edgar, who hesitated to confront Heathcliff out of fear, and Linton, who-”

“Was a whiny brat,” Karma puts in helpfully. “And his mother was only marginally better. Although she was more of an idiot.”

She’s not wrong. “What did you think of Hareton and Cathy?”

Momentarily stymied by the non-sequitur, Karma takes a moment to respond, fingers drumming on the tabletop. “Um, I didn’t really get it at first. I guess it’s like redemption, for all of their ancestors’ mistakes and stuff.”

“Exactly. Linton represents the worst of both lines--he has all the impetuousness and brashness of the Earnshaws but is a weak, snivelling coward. Cathy seems more Earnshaw than Linton at first, with her pony rides and defying Nelly, but she tempers out with her father’s influence. Her rebellious recklessness and daring become good things with compassion and empathy, as shown when she actually stands up to Heathcliff. Hareton is also at first hostile and surly, not to mention illiterate after Heathcliff denies him education, just like Hindley deprived Heathcliff of education. But he has a burning desire to improve himself, and with Cathy’s help, he does. They both represent the best of their families, and with their union, they bring those things together.”

**(end spoilers)**

The passion in his voice is evident, and Karma resists grinning at his enthusiasm--no more outwardly enthusiastic than he would be in any situation, but she’s never seen him quite so engaged in something.

“Do you remember any particular scenes?” he asks. “Any quotes that stuck out to you?”

“Oh, so many.” She frowns. “Although I didn’t bookmark any of them.”

He picks up the book. “That’s fine. I’ve read this book enough times that I probably know where most of them are.”

A grin spreads across her face unbound this time. “You are a nerd.”

Heathcliff looks totally unashamed. “Can you blame me?”

“Honestly, no,” she concedes, grinning even wider. “Okay, one of them was…”

\---

It’s almost midnight, again, by the time she remembers why she even read this book in the first place.

“So why Heathcliff?” she asks Heathcliff, picking up her ribbon bookmark and winding it around her finger idly. The sky blue ribbon complements the dull scarlet fabric nicely.

He shrugs one shoulder. “I connected with him the most out of all the characters. I can sympathize with his desire for revenge.”

She blinks at him, curious. “Really.”

“Yes.” He doesn’t elaborate, although he doesn’t seem uncomfortable, just thoughtful. “Which character do you relate to the most?”

“Ah, honestly, I feel like I’m pretty tame compared to all of them,” she admits sheepishly, but he surprises her with a soft snort of amusement.

“‘Tame’ is the last adjective I would use to describe you,” he tells her flatly.

Her lips twist in a smirk. “Okay, okay...If I had to pick, I’d choose one of the Catherines.”

“I think so too. Probably the younger.” There’s an almost fond look in his expression. “You have a way of getting what you want, no matter what.”

She shrugs cheerfully in concession, and she happens to glance at the clock. “Oh, wow, it’s past twelve.”

He turns to look at it too (maybe that’s why he never sleeps at a reasonable time--he can’t actually see the clock without turning). “Indeed.”

With a groan, she stands up and stretches. “Well, thanks for the book talk. It was fun.”

He stands as well, turning off the lamp and leaving the room lit by the moon. “It was. Although the work I’ll have to catch up on tomorrow won’t be.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll help you out. It’s the least I can do.”

Asuna’s already asleep by the time Karma gets to their room. After changing and burrowing under her covers, Karma lies awake for a few more minutes, thinking. Reading the book didn’t give her as much insight into Heathcliff as she might’ve liked, but it was entertaining to see him get so into something nonetheless.

She wonders what else drew him to Heathcliff’s character, when at first glance, they seem so far apart. But she doubts she’ll get a straight answer, more than she already has, by asking again, so she resolves to figure it out as she goes.

\---

A few days later, Heathcliff sends her back out again. She’s in the threshold of his office when she turns around and says in what she hopes is a casual tone, “You have any other books by Emily Bronte?”

A smug gleam appears in his eyes. “No, she only wrote one book.”

“Oh.”

Without breaking eye contact, he reaches back and pulls _Wuthering Heights_ off his shelf again. “But you can borrow this one again, if you want.”

Karma prances forward, beaming. “Thank you, Heathcliff!” she sing-songs, grinning from ear to ear.

Luckily, that wasn’t his only copy, because he never does get it back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> P.S.: Read Wuthering Heights. :)


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here, have some of Crazy Karma and Not Amused Heathcliff XD
> 
> (I wrote the first one to be before they met Asuna, by the way)

**_Beauty: 1/24/2023_ **

Their breaths form white clouds of condensation in front of their faces, a minute detail that accentuates the experience even more. The cold air tickles the inside of Karma’s nostrils as she takes deep breaths, cheeks flushed in delight. They couldn’t have picked a more perfect night to take this trip.

“Don’t go too far ahead!”

At Heathcliff’s chastising call, Karma just laughs, braids flying as she whirls around to cup her hands around her mouth. “It’s not my fault you guys are slow!”

To be fair, they’re making good progress. The mountainous tundras are hard to navigate, real or virtual, and her party members can be...clumsy, at times. The snow is densely packed, which doesn’t make it much easier for them. Being of a much lighter build with far higher speed and agility stats, Karma can run overtop of the thin sheet of ice covering most of the packed snow if she runs fast enough, while her party members have to crunch through the knee-deep snow. It makes her feel like a snowshoe hare in a herd of muskox.

She waits patiently for them to catch up, though, leaning against a dark rock outcropping to watch their progress while keeping an eye out for hostiles. When Heathcliff is within a few meters of her, she takes off again, dancing nimbly across the frigid landscape.

Her delighted laughter carries faintly back to the others as she skips on ahead, and Godfree shakes his head ruefully. “Glad someone’s having fun.”

Uzala staggers up next to him, bracing his hands on his knees. He’s got longer legs, and even he’s wading nearly knee-deep through the snow.

“When we get to the top,” he pants, face veiled with puffs of condensation, “we’re mobbing her with a snowball fight.”

Muldar lumbers up to them, followed by Fultz, who states, “Agreed,” before sitting down hard.

Heathcliff glances back at them, looking amused—whether it’s at their conversation or their overall states of _done,_ it’s hard to tell. “That’s not very fair.”

“Neither is the fact that she’s just waltzing right over the snow like some winter fairy,” Muldar grumbles, taking out some rations.

Suddenly, a thunderous roar comes from up ahead, and all of them whirl around as a gleeful voice shrieks, “Look what I found!”

Stomping down the steep incline of the next stretch is a huge, white polar bear with icicles growing out of its back like spines. It’s easily over three meters tall and seems to have no trouble plowing right through the dense snow and ice on all fours, leaving cracked footprints behind it.

And on its back-

“Are you kidding me?!” Uzala demands incredulously, even as Karma lets out another shriek of laughter, her sword gleaming white in the moonlight.

Sure enough, seated between two glittering icicle spikes is a lithe figure, braids whipping about as the polar bear monster attempts to shake her off. But her grip is steel, and she looks way too cheerful to give up now.

“Giddy up!” she fairly screams. With both hands, she shoves her sword into the back of the monster’s head, making some of her party members wince, and uses it to wrench the polar bear’s head in the direction of the group, to their trepidation.

The polar bear lets out a noise halfway between a roar and a whine, and begins to gallop in their direction, the ground shaking more and more furiously as it gets closer. To their credit, no one backs away, but Heathcliff is pretty sure he heard someone whimper (or maybe it was the polar bear; he wouldn’t blame it). As he raises his shield, he wonders why his past self thought it was a good idea to add this terrifying lunatic to the party.

Or more accurately, he wonders how a once meek, timid teenager who hesitated to smile became this terrifying lunatic.

At Karma’s shout, they scatter, and she leaps nimbly off of the beast as she sends it charging straight into a rock outcropping head-first, triggering an immortal object warning from the terrain and a bewildered, strangely high-pitched yelp from the monster. Heathcliff is pretty sure they’re not supposed to make that kind of noise.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he asks neutrally as she rolls through the snow next to him.

“Hunting!” she declares, popping up to her feet with a fine dusting of snow in her hair. “Too bad he’s hostile. He would’ve made great transportation through the rest of the tundra!”

“You’re insane,” Uzala tells her, and Heathcliff is pretty sure that the man’s voice is also not supposed to go that high.

She just giggles. A lot. Her grin is so wide that her eyes virtually disappear. It might be his imagination, but Heathcliff thinks he might’ve heard a hysterical mewl from the monster before it charges.

\---

“Ahhh, this is _beautiful!”_

Ignoring Heathcliff’s admonition to slow down, Karma barrels up the last incline of the snowy tunnel enthusiastically, kicking snow and ice back down at her party members before she bursts out of the tunnel.

She stands at the peak of one of many mountains, and the ground plunges from a rocky platform into a steep descent down to the bottom. The mountains form a rough bowl shape, wreathing a crystalline lake that’s entirely still, covered in a thick sheet of ice. A few evergreens dot the shore, dusted with a thick layer of snow as well.

Her breath fogs in front of her as she pants, staring around at her fathomless surroundings in sheer delight. The velvet night sky is dotted with diamond-like stars that wink conspiratorially at her, and in the wake of its limitless, infinite grandeur, she suddenly feels extremely small and alone.

That feeling is quickly dispelled as she hears footsteps behind her, and she turns with a huge smile as her friends come through the tunnel behind her. “We made it!”

“We can tell,” Heathcliff says dryly as he comes to stand next to her. The full moon shines brightly, casting his gray hair in a sheen of pure silver.

Behind their backs, Uzala points at Karma and winks at the others, who grin back (yet make no move to assist him). Godfree just shakes his head, crossing his arms with a grin of his own. Slowly, Uzala tiptoes towards Karma, who seems enraptured with the sights-

In a whirl of snow and night sky, Uzala suddenly finds himself staring down at a very, very steep slope towards the lake, feet braced against the edge of the platform, and he lets out an embarrassingly high-pitched bleat as Karma laughs above him, one hand hooked casually into the back of his armor. Her grip feels a little too loose to be secure, in his humble opinion.

“Nice try,” she tells him, snickering. “Did you honestly think I didn’t expect that from you? So how do you plead your case?”

He giggles nervously, gulping at just how far down that fall is. His feet scrabble futilely for a moment, sending pebbles falling a long, long, _long_ way down.

“Would begging work?” he squeaks, voice cracking.

“Maybe if you ask _super_ nicely to make up for the fact that you can’t get down on your knees.”

“Oh, if I’d known you were into that-”

“Do you _want_ me to drop you?”

“NO.”

“You’re having way too much fun today,” Heathcliff says dryly from next to them.

“No such thing as too much fun,” she informs him, nodding seriously, though the effect is ruined somewhat by her Cheshire cat grin.

“If you say so. Anyway, put him down and look up.”

With a curious blink, she shrugs and hauls Uzala up, gently (for her, at least) pushing him back to solid ground, before turning her gaze skyward.

The resulting sight takes her breath away.

Rich, pulsating colors splash across the sky, flickering and wavering like an illusion. A thousand shades of green dance on a canvas of dark satin. The diamond stars coruscate from within their veil of colors, mischievously elusive.

She finds herself reaching out a hand for them, as if she might be able to snag them within her grasp if she tries hard enough. Her vision blurs slightly, and she swallows down a lump in her throat as tears slide down her cheeks. Never before in her real life has she seen sights this stunning.

She’s vaguely aware of the others fanning out next to them, all of them as entranced as she is. Someone murmurs, “I’ve never seen the northern lights before…”

“Japan is too far south of the auroral oval,” Heathcliff explains, but even his typically impassive tone contains a measure of reverence. “You’d have to go much farther north.”

The words tumble out of Karma’s throat. “This world is beautiful,” she whispers thickly. She’ll be forever grateful that her real life friends and family haven’t been subjected to this death game, but _holy crap_ are they missing out.

As she lowers her hand to dash her sleeve across her face, she misses the surprised look on Heathcliff’s face, which settles into a small smile of quiet appreciation.

\---

_** Halloween!: 10/31/2023 ** _

At the knock on the door, Karma goes to answer it. “Oh, hey— _oh.”_

Heathcliff raises his eyebrows at her, seeming perplexed. “What is it?”

She goggles at him, mouth agape. “Your hair is down.”

His confusion turns to mild exasperation at what he probably thinks is an overreaction. “Oh. That. The others insisted I do something for Halloween. I figured this was enough of a change in itself to be a costume.”

Well, he’s right about that. Karma continues to stare. “You look so different,” she says in awe.

He rolls his eyes a bit. “Yes, I’m sure. I was just going to tell you-”

“Can I braid it?” she asks eagerly, grinning now.

“...Excuse me?”

“Uh, did I stutter? Come on, this is a prime opportunity! It’ll only take a second. I do Asuna’s hair most days that I’m here, and she has a lot more of it than you.” Without waiting for or particularly caring about his response, she grabs his sleeve and pulls him inside, kicking the door shut behind her. “Okay, sit down.”

It only takes her practiced hands two or three minutes to do it; she’s gotten used to doing it with gloves now. “There! Aren’t you pretty!” she cheers, barely repressing a fit of giggles.

He runs a hand through his loose hair. “I thought you said you were going to braid it.”

“I did!”

Just then, Asuna comes walking back in, having changed into her own costume—a pumpkin witch. “Oh, hey, what’s— _oh._ My god.”

She slaps a hand over her mouth with a muffled squeal, and Karma beams. “I _know_ , right?!”

Heathcliff turns to look at Karma sternly. “What did you do?”

She tosses him a mirror and holds one up herself so that he can see behind him. “You two match!”

“Oh my god, that little red bow is so cute!”

“Here, I have another one in my inventory.”

“Ooh, thanks!”

Ignoring his annoyed admonitions, they drag Heathcliff down the stairs to show the others, and Karma bursts into the kitchen with a gleeful, “Guess what I did!”

In the ensuing silence, Uzala’s coffee mug shatters on the floor. “Oh. My god.”

Asuna pops up next to a very unamused Heathcliff. “We match! Happy Halloween!” she manages to say before devolving into a fit of hysterical laughter, and of course, that hits the switch for everyone else.

“Ooh, can you braid my hair?!” Uzala asks eagerly, half in tears from laughing so hard. The fact that he’s not even upset about his spilled coffee speaks volumes.

“Sure! But you gotta keep it for the whole day.”

“Awesome!”

A few minutes later…

“Wait, why are there two of them?”

Godfree falls out of his chair laughing. “You look like a grade school girl!” he hoots, rolling around on the floor.

“There wasn’t enough hair to do one braid down the back,” Karma explains through her laughter, backing up to admire her handiwork. “I can’t believe you actually let me do that!”

“I didn’t know you’d give me pigtails!”

Kili cackles loudly in delight. “You look adorable! And remember, you gotta keep it for the whole day!”

“Karma, I hate your guts. Wait, did you put Hello Kitty ribbons on them?!”

Karma has to hold onto Heathcliff’s shoulder to stay upright as tears start to stream down her face. She chances a look up at him, and promptly starts laughing harder at how completely _done_ he looks.

He tries to undo the work she did on his hair, and she jumps to stop him.

“Wait, no, don’t!” she protests, grabbing his arm with a pleading look. “I worked so hard on that!”

“It took you less than two minutes.”

“But it looks good! And you’re never going to let me do it again, so just keep it for a day!”

He gives her a long-suffering look. But when he lowers his hand with a sigh, she beams, and Asuna cheers with uncharacteristic enthusiasm.

\---

_** Winter Wonder: 12/25/2023 ** _

The door bangs open, letting out a sound of protest at the violent action.

“Merry Christmas, _danchou!”_ Karma cheers loudly, and Heathcliff stares.

“...What are you wearing?”

She grins and does a spin, somehow not spilling a drop of coffee (one of the cups he can see has about four large marshmallows melting in it, and he desperately hopes they’re not both like that). “You like it? We went shopping yesterday!”

He blinks several times and rubs his forehead at the complete monstrosity that is the shade of bright, _bright_ red on her outfit—an absolute _disgrace_ to all other shades of red. “...That is an eyesore.”

“Oh, I know.” She places a cup of black (thank all the gods) coffee on his desk. He notices her gloves are now lined with white fur. “You want some marshmallows? They’re really good. I might make this a habit.”

“No, thank you,” he says firmly, taking his cup before she can do anything to it.

She shrugs. “Your loss.” Her expression brightens. “Gifts! I got you something!”

He waits for her to pull something out of her inventory, but she snorts out a laugh and points at his mug. Curiously, he looks at it, and makes a deadpan face. “Really?”

“Hey, they are _all_ valid, don’t even _try_ to deny it. The others helped, by the way.”

Heathcliff sighs, turning the mug slowly to read the sayings on the sides. “I can tell.”

_[I don’t have a 9-5. I have a ‘when I open my eyes’ to ‘when I close my eyes’.]_

_[Help us help you help yourself while also helping all of us.]_

_[What is a weekend.]_

_[What is bedtime. What is sleep.]_

_[I haven’t seen the sun in years.]_

Sadly, he thinks the last one might be true in real life too.

“Where did you get this?” he asks her, and she grins, rocking back on her heels looking very pleased with herself.

“Some little store on one of the lower floors. I was there for an assignment at one point and remembered it, so I went back and custom-ordered that,” she explains. “Cute, right?”

Suddenly, she frowns at the sight of his desk, cluttered with papers already despite the early hour. “You weren’t planning to stay inside the whole day and work, were you?” Without waiting for an answer, she continues right along, “No? Great, that’s what I thought.”

Rivaling even the Lightning Flash’s speed (that nickname made her cackle when she first heard it passed around; little did a very embarrassed Asuna know that Karma was the one who started it), she whips out a matching Santa hat, pulls it down lopsidedly over his head, and drags him out the door. “Come on, come on, come on, the others are waiting!”

\---

The fields outside Nolfret are greatly varied in altitude—the hills can be gentle, rolling slopes, or steep, almost mountain-like constructs. But hidden off the beaten path through a dense forest halfway up a slope is a hidden gem.

Like a cartoon, Uzala tumbles down the slope with a fading shriek, accumulating a cocoon of snow until he hits the frozen water. The snow around him explodes upon impact, and he skids across it like a hockey puck, helplessly out of control. Karma almost wishes she wasn’t laughing so hard, because the tears are kind of obstructing her vision of this glorious moment.

“Did you,” she chokes out in mirth, reaching out to shake Asuna’s arm, “did you get the, uh, the—the pictures? Did you get pictures?”

Also giggling uncontrollably, the brunette nods a few times as she puts away her recording crystal, her Santa hat bobble swaying with the motion. “I’ll send them to you later.”

Faintly, from quite a ways below them: “I hate you all!”

Godfree cups a hand around his mouth and yells back, “Love you too, buddy!” with a massive grin and a chortle of amusement.

Karma is reminded fondly of the time they went ice skating. It was just six of them back then; they didn’t even have Asuna. This time, they invited a lot more KoB members who didn’t have anything better to do—Sanza, Segro, Daizen (head of finances, and a mace-wielder), and some other members that Karma doesn’t know as well. Some of them are down by the pond, while others-

She squeals when something cold hits the back of her head, hard, and she whirls around, eyes spitting fire. “WHO DID THAT?!”

Sanza and Segro immediately point at each other, and both promptly take off running with hysterical screams as she tears after them, a grin splitting her face from ear to ear.

\---

Some time later, she sits down heavily against a pine tree next to Heathcliff with a long puff of cloudy white condensation, nose and cheeks and ear tips red as cherries and pleasantly exhausted.

“Thanks for the assist, by the way,” she remarks cheerfully, stretching out her legs with a sigh. “That shield of yours sure does come in handy.”

He visibly rolls his eyes. “Yes, because that’s what it was made for—snowball fights.”

“Hey, that was a _war_ of _utmost_ importance,” she insists, holding up a finger dramatically. “Don’t even pretend otherwise.”

He shakes his head, giving up on trying to contribute some common sense to the world. “What are they doing now?”

“Um…” She peers down the hill. “Building a gigantic snowman, making an igloo, and trying to ice skate without ice skates.”

“Why am I not surprised...Are you going to join them?”

“As soon as I convince you to come with me.”

“I’ll stay here, thank you very much,” he says quickly, but she narrows her eyes.

“Uh-uh, not this time,” she declares determinedly. “Heathcliff, it’s Christmas! You’re allowed to relax and have fun too!” She’s the only person in the guild who calls him just by his handle anymore.

“Watching all of you make fools of yourselves is my version of having fun.”

“But-”

His voice hardens slightly. “Karma.”

She hesitates, startled at his tone; instead of drawing back, though, she withdraws in, shoulders hunching. “I’m sorry. I didn’t-”

“No,” he interrupts before she can carry on too long, reaching out to touch her shoulder. “I appreciate the thought,” he tells her sincerely, and she feels some warmth return to her, spreading from where his hand rests on her shoulder. “I just prefer to keep my distance, is all. And you were right—this is certainly preferable to sitting in my office all day.” Before she can respond, he opens up his inventory. “...I got something for you too.”

Her eyes widen in shock, then her expression softens, and he knows he made the right choice. “You didn’t have to.”

“Neither did you,” he points out, scrolling through his inventory.

She reaches forward when he holds out a small box to her; before it even touches her gloved hands, she’s smiling widely, like she’s eight and not eighteen. “Can I open it?”

“Go ahead.”

Nestled in a layer of red fabric is a simple black leather cord with a silver and scarlet pendant, obviously custom made to look like the KoB cross sword emblem. A squeak of delight escapes her at the ornament, and also simply the gesture of the gift itself.

“I know you don’t wear the emblem on your outfit for secrecy reasons, but I thought you might appreciate having a piece of the guild close whenever you’re away,” he explains.

A warm smile spreads across her face, and she leans over and wraps an arm around him, nestling her chin on his shoulder for a second. “Thank you, Heathcliff. Merry Christmas.”

At somewhat of a loss, he returns the one-armed embrace tentatively. “...Merry Christmas.”

With a delighted hum and a giggle, she pulls back and equips the necklace, leaving it out in the open for now. Later, when she goes back out to hunt down player-killers, she’ll tuck it under her collar or something. For now, though, there’s no need.

“Hey, can I borrow your shield?” she asks suddenly with a grin as she gets to her feet. “Just the shield.”

Still reeling slightly in surprise from her gesture, he hesitates before drawing his sword from the shield. “...Why?”

She wiggles her fingers in a ‘gimme’ motion, grin widening. “Can I borrow your shield?” is all she says.

Against his better judgement, he unsheathes his sword and stands up to hand her his shield. She takes the straps, and almost drops it with a grunt of surprise at the weight. Muttering under her breath, she shifts her grip on it a bit and backs up a few steps.

He realizes what she’s about to do a second too late. “Karma-”

 _“BANZAI!”_ she shrieks before launching herself forward on his shield like a sled.

All he can think is that while designing his weapon, he did not do so with the intention of someone using it as a _sled,_ and that it is strangely proficient at fulfilling that function (and while doing so, also fulfilling the function of a bowling ball, knocking down all players indiscriminately like bowling pins).

With a half-irritated, half-affectionate huff, he makes his way down towards the yelling and shouting heap of players to retrieve his shield. After getting it back from a very unrepentant Karma, he retreats to a nearby fallen pine tree to watch the proceedings. When a stray snowball hits him while he’s lost in thought, though, he has little choice but to seek revenge.

It only occurs to him afterwards that if her goal was to get him to join the rest of them, then damn. It worked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had some fun writing these XD


	12. Chapter 12

**_Happy New Year’s: 12/30/2023_ **

After a brief knock, Asuna throws open the office door and slams it shut behind her with considerable force—enough to trigger the ‘Immortal Object’ warning from the building.

Uzala subtly scooches his chair away from the remaining open one. “Dare I ask what that cruel and unusual mistreatment of innocent furniture was about?”

She huffs, throwing herself into the open chair. “Another idiot tried to ask me to the gala. The one that _we’re_ hosting.”

“Ah. How many does that make?”

She glares. “I don’t know. I lost track after they hit double digits.”

Godfree pats her shoulder comfortingly. “Two more days.”

“Ugh.”

Heathcliff looks slightly less sympathetic. “Well, you _are_ one of the most eligible ba-”

“Don’t. Even.” She heaves a long sigh, shoulders slumping in dejection. “Not to mention, Karma said she might not be back in time.”

“Oh, good, she already told you,” Heathcliff mutters under his breath. Asuna’s too busy still ranting in the direction of Uzala, who’s too busy wondering if she’s going to try and run him through with her rapier to blow off steam, but Godfree hears him and winks in understanding. None of them would be eager to be a bringer of bad news to an already-irate Asuna.

If they stop and think, it might seem strange that the two scariest members of the guild are the two teenage girls in the guild. But that’s been normal for a while, so.

“Were you hoping to wrestle her into a dress?” Godfree asks Asuna teasingly, and she pouts.

“Well, I’ll admit, that was one thing,” the brunette concedes, crossing her arms. “But if she was coming, I could say I was already going with someone, ‘cause she wouldn’t mind, and it’s not like the rumors would affect her anyway, and then people would quit asking me!”

Suddenly, Heathcliff opens up a window in front of him. “Well, I don’t think you’d envy how she spent the last twelve hours…”

Asuna looks very skeptical. “Oh really.”

With a wry smirk, he makes the window visible to the other players and spins it around so they can see. It’s a message, obviously from Karma, with two pictures attached.

The rapier-wielder pouts at the spectacular sunrise picture, all hazy pink and yellow and purple and red gradients over a jaw-dropping view of the mountains on one of the lower floors. “Well, that’s nice and dandy for her!”

Heathcliff just says, “Look at the second one, and the message.”

Frowning, Asuna scrolls down. “...Oh.”

_[Don’t mind me, just froze my bony ass off all last night._ -_- _]_

A snort explodes out of Uzala’s nose at the next picture, and Asuna winces, slightly more sympathetic now. It’s of Karma huddled by an honestly pathetic little fire in the middle of a cave, surrounded by icicles of all different shapes and sizes, and she’s giving the record crystal her best unimpressed deadpan glare.

\---

_ 12/31/2023 _

The cave system returns to its normal, eerie gloominess when Karma switches off her searching skill. She exhales a puff of misty condensation and trudges in. Aside from the _plink plink_ of water drops occasionally sliding down from the stalactites on the ceiling and her own footsteps, the dungeon is totally quiet.

She grimaces when a drop lands on her head and slides down the back of her neck, to her great dismay. Her thin boots, which are soaked through with ice water from traipsing through snow all night, don’t make matters any better.

“Bloody orange players,” she mutters under her breath, scowling. The activity of orange guilds has increased dramatically over the past few weeks, leaving her busier than ever. It was a miracle she was able to get a whole day off on Christmas.

And now she has to skip what’s surely a very festive, very _not freezing_ New Year’s party where she would be able to spend some well-deserved time with her friends and family, maybe do a bit of dancing, eat good food…

Instead, she’s been stuck here, in the middle of nowhere, alone, freezing cold, and living off of chunky bread rations for the past three days, looking for this god-forsaken guild.

Suddenly, her sixth sense tingles, and she whirls around to see three silhouettes stepping out from behind a cluster of stalagmites, brandishing weapons.

“Looks like you decided to pay us a visit after all,” one of them remarks, grinning.

Thoroughly _done,_ Karma glares at him and his buddies, and her frustration only increases the longer she stares. Their equipment is mediocre at best, and the way they hold their weapons is amateurish and all swagger.

_This_ is what she’s missing the party for?

“Look,” she starts, practically seething, “I got almost no sleep last night because I was busy freezing half to death in a cave while looking for you jerks, and I’m missing a very fun party right now to haul your sorry asses to prison. Could you at least have given me _some_ kind of a challenge so that I can somewhat feel like I didn’t just _completely_ waste time I could’ve spent with my friends dancing and having fun?”

Even as she vents, she can hear more footsteps coming up behind her—five more, by the sounds. “You seem awfully confident for someone who’s surrounded and outnumbered.”

Karma sighs, running her free hand down her face, which is numb with cold. “What I am is awfully _pissed off._ Can we just make a deal here? You guys come peacefully without a fight, since it’ll just be a waste of our time anyway, and I won’t have to humiliate you guys, _plus_ I’d make it to the party in time for the countdown!”

In response, one of them charges her with a frenzied cry, sword raised. In a blur of crimson, she kicks him through a few stalagmites, glaring. “Why are you guys even doing this on New Year’s Eve anyways? Might as well take a day off from the stealing and murdering shtick.”

“You said it yourself. All the clearers are at your little party,” another orange player sneers. “What better time than now?”

Karma stares at him. “Did you really just say that? Did you just forget who you’re talking to? You know what, I’m just gonna fight you guys now. Good grief, now I almost feel sorry for Heathcliff when he has to deal with us being morons…”

Maybe if she moves fast enough, she can even catch the countdown.

She makes quick work of the orange players and ties them up with practiced efficiency. As she does so, she checks her watch—11:44. She still has fifteen minutes to get to the venue before the countdown. It’ll take a few minutes to transport these guys to the Black Iron Palace, and then maybe another minute to run to the gate in the Town of Beginnings, but the venue isn’t too far away from the gate in the town it’s in, so maybe…

One of the younger orange players whimpers when she tightens the ropes with a little more force than necessary in her excitement. “Oh, man, they’re gonna throw a fit…”

Her hands freeze. Quietly, she repeats, “‘They?’”

He goes stock still, and one of the other guys curses. “Dammit, you moron, why’d you go and say that?!”

Are there more she missed? Argo said this was all. With a cold _shrring!_ , she draws her sword again, kicking the blabbermouth to the floor harshly. “Who’s _they?”_ she demands, pairing her best death glare with her best death voice.

It works. He squeaks, scrambling backwards awkwardly, still half-tied-up. “W-we were supposed to m-meet them in the f-fields on F-Floor 12 and ambush this guild—or else we won’t get in!”

One of his comrades groans loudly. “Shut _up!_ You wanna ruin Laughing Coffin before we even get a chance to-”

He cuts himself off, flushing bright red at his own mistake, and Karma narrows her eyes, slowly turning to face him. “Laughing Coffin?”

His eyes dart side to side as he slowly edges backwards nervously. “Wh-what? I didn’t say anything-”

In a blur of crimson, she lunges to cover the few meters between them in a split second. With easy agility, she comes to a dead standstill in a crouch before him, the edge of her blade pressed against his neck.

“Spill,” she growls menacingly, pressing the blade in deeper to elicit bright red pixels.

He’s hyperventilating, but he squeezes his eyes shut and turns away. “N-no! I’m not betraying them to a monster like you!”

That’s rich, she thinks to herself with an inward scoff. “How noble. Truly, one of a kind,” she drawls sarcastically, smiling. “But I’m sure you’re not the only one who knows, so why don’t I just cut off your head and ask someone a little more...compliant?”

Of course, she won’t, not while they’re tied up like this. But they don’t know that, and they don’t need to.

\---

Heathcliff eyes the clock—11:57. Karma said she might not make it, but if he knows her at all, she’d try her damndest to be here with Asuna and the others. He sort of pities the orange players she’ll run into today.

Suddenly, a message alert pings—speak of the devil. But if she messaged instead of coming to talk in person…

His stomach sinks a bit as he opens it up.

_[Something bad came up. Tell everyone sorry. Debrief in the morning.]_

\---

Karma strides quickly down the streets, counting the signs. Without warning, she swivels and turns into a dark alleyway, wrinkling her nose slightly at its state of cleanliness.

“You just had to pick the grossest alleyway on the Floor, didja,” she remarks without much humor.

Argo pushes her hood back, whiskers pulled down by a frown. “It’s bad,” she says bluntly. “This Laughing Coffin group isn’t just a ragtag bunch of idiots. They’ve been organizing en masse for the past few weeks, maybe even months. All the increased orange player activity of the last few weeks has been initiation to their ranks, a sort of test for the newbies. From what I managed to wring out of one of my contacts, the Laughing Coffin guys have the fabled red cursors.”

“Red cursors?” she echoes with narrowed eyes, her blood chilling.

“They were a rumor in the beta. Three months of criminal conduct and your cursor turns red. The beta was only a month, so no one saw it.” Argo takes a deep breath, running a hand through her hair. “They’re planning mass attacks tonight. All the clearers are celebrating, and some other players are bound to go out to party in the fields and have their first hunts of the year or whatever. Laughing Coffin is going to strike tonight and make their bloody debut.”

Her jaw clenches at the thought, her breathing quickening. “Do you know any of their targets?”

Argo gives her a serious look. “You’re not going to get to all of them in time.”

Her gloved hand closes tightly around the handle of her sword. “I have to do my best. If I can get to some, it’ll have to be enough,” she says icily, recalling the words her guild leader once said.

\---

_ 1/1/2024 _

Karma slams open the door, panting. “What’s the situa—woah.”

After getting an urgent message from Heathcliff saying that she needs to get to the clearers’ HQ as soon as possible, she did so, expecting a one on one discussion, maybe with Asuna and the others. What she didn’t expect was to burst into the conference room and see _everyone._ Some other guild masters are here as well—DDA, Fuurinkazan, even some ALF, who typically work on the lower floors. There are also several well-known solo players standing around the perimeter of the room. All in all, this looks almost like a boss fight meeting (except it’s six in the morning, and everyone except Heathcliff looks dead).

Silence descends over every single person when she pauses in the threshold, baffled by the gathering. She looks over at Heathcliff for some kind of explanation, eyes wide.

“Good, you’re here,” he says brusquely, nodding at the empty seat next to him. “Argo came to us earlier in the morning and told us about the situation.”

“Okay,” she replies, walking over slowly and sitting down. “If she told you, what’s so urgent that you need me for?”

“We’re going over what she told us, and deciding how to approach this moving forward as a whole.”

“We were just discussing how this cropped up seemingly out of nowhere,” Lind of DDA interjects coldly, his gaze fixed on her. “You deal with player-killers, don’t you? How did you just now realize-”

Karma is about ready to lose it. The DDA has always had a deep-seated, very unrequited rivalry against KoB for title of ‘top guild’ in SAO. Lind, their leader, has missed no opportunity to needle them for every possible slip-up, and after a vicious orange guild attack against his own guild, he’s been especially quick to breathe down her neck about PK-related incidents. Needless to say, she’s about done.

“Okay, buddy,” she interrupts, not caring at this point how rude it is, “I’m running on two hours of sleep for the last forty-eight hours here, and I just spent all of last night running _literally_ all over Aincrad chasing down these red players when I totally could’ve been at the party! I am _done._ Believe me, I’m wondering the same thing that you are! But it’s not going to help now. If you wanna keep pissing me off, I’ll be happy to throw hands, but if you don’t have anything helpful to contribute, then kindly, I stress, _shut up.”_

Lind turns a very unflattering shade of maroon, mouth working up and down furiously, but no words come out, to her satisfaction.

“Now,” she huffs, turning to glance at Heathcliff, who looks the slightest bit amused, “why was I called?”

He and everyone else turn to a strange player sitting at the other end of the table. Karma’s never seen him before. “Please, start from the beginning,” Heathcliff says calmly.

The player takes a deep breath, visibly trembling in his seat. “M-my name is Kai,” he starts, gaze glued to the table, only flickering up every so often. “M-my party was attacked by Laughing Coffin t-today. They w-wanted me to b-bring a message...They took m-my party members and t-told me to go to the Knights of the Blood Oath.”

Karma feels a chill descend around the room—this is everyone’s first time hearing it, so it seems. She thinks she knows what’s coming.

The player hunches his shoulders. “Th-the leader...PoH...He wants...He wants K-Karma, of the Knights of the Blood Oath, to m-meet them and f-face them, alone, by n-noon.”

The room is pindrop silent; it’s deafening. Karma tries to take deep breaths, even as her heartbeat roars in her ears. He doesn’t need to say what’ll happen if the demands aren’t met.

Everyone watches her. Every eye is fixed on her next move.

From a logical standpoint, the answer is obvious. _Don’t go._ Why should she? These hostages can’t be anywhere near as valuable as she is as a player, judging by the mediocre level of Kai’s equipment. And if she gets taken down now, that leaves the front lines more vulnerable to player-killers. It’s not as if her actions make a _huge_ difference; even she is just one person, despite her best efforts. But she’s well-known. Her defeat would trigger a boldness in the other orange guilds, slowing down the front lines and forcing them to fight on two fronts.

“Where am I supposed to go?” she asks quietly.

“No way, you can’t just walk into this trap by yourself!” Asuna shouts her down instantly, copper eyes flashing.

“We don’t have any other choice, and with as much of a danger as they obviously pose, it was going to happen eventually,” she retorts, calm by contrast—at least on the outside. “Might as well be now. Where am I supposed to go?” she repeats to Kai, a razor edge in her voice now that she’s voiced her resolve aloud.

He swallows audibly. “Th-the Wolf Plains, at the s-stone ruins at the t-top of the tallest hill.”

Damn. That gives her nowhere that she can hide and watch from afar. The plains are a vast expanse of land with no cover, and from the hilltop, they have the benefit of height and a good vantage point to watch anyone approaching. They’d see from miles away if she brought reinforcements.

She places her gloved hands flat on the table and stands, scraping her chair back as she draws herself up to her full height. “Think they’ll mind if I show up a little early?” she asks roughly, baring her teeth for a split second as a hint of a snarl twists her expression. The question was rhetorical and directed at no one in particular, but the people near her, excluding her guildmates, edge away from her slightly nonetheless.

A party invite pops up in front of her, and she blinks at Heathcliff, who explains, “We’ll monitor your HP from here.”

His stony calm helps soothe her own nerves. She nods and accepts the invite; a second later, Asuna’s name pops up beneath hers as well. The brunette opens her mouth to say something but hesitates, and Karma tries to smile at her to reassure her.

“Be careful,” Heathcliff says quietly as she passes his chair on her way out.

She blinks, a little surprised. He never tells her to be careful; he’s never had to. She surprises both of them with a soft laugh and rests her right hand on the hilt of her sword.

“Of course,” is all she trusts herself to say before she pushes open the doors. She can’t help but let a hint of a low growl enter her voice as she says, “You won’t get rid of me that easy.”

\---

_ 1/1/2024 _

Karma has her sword drawn before she even steps off the teleport gate. She highly doubts anyone’s going to try anything in the town, especially when they specified a meeting place, but it doesn’t hurt to be careful. And she won’t lie and say that having her sword in her hand doesn’t ease her anxiety. Despite her thrumming nerves, though, she doesn’t rush. She’s sure she’s being watched, and she starts towards the town gate that leads to the fields at a leisurely walk.

She glances up at the corner of her HUD again. Heathcliff and Asuna’s names are still there beneath her own, and she tries to draw comfort that they’re watching. She quickly pulls up her message app and types out a message: _[Safe.]_ When the hostage is out of danger, she can pull up the app in an instant and send it. Hopefully.

The town is almost deserted at such an early hour. Ignoring the few NPCs and players out and about, she sets out towards the fields, and what is almost certain to be a trap.

\---

Heathcliff raises an eyebrow as three players enter his office—Asuna, a black-clad solo player, and a whiskered woman in a brown cloak. “Kirito-kun, Argo-san.”

“It’s about Karma-chan,” Argo says without preamble. “Remember that guy who showed up with the message from Laughing Coffin?”

“He was a beta tester,” Kirito continues. “It took me a while to remember, but I got in touch with Argo to check.”

\---

Karma’s hand is steady as she stares up at the ruins. The sun is barely starting to rise, a low, red glow that perfectly mimics the cursor she can see at the top of the hill, where a cloaked figure sits on a fallen piece of debris.

“You’re early.” Kai said his name was PoH, or something.

“Might as well get this over with. My guild leader likes us to be on top of things. The earlier I report back, the better.”

But even her cold bravado falters slightly when more and more cloaked figures slip out from within the ruins, all wielding various weapons. She swallows hard when she sees how many of them there are—ten, fifteen, twenty…Her heart drums up a nervous tempo in her ribcage, and she grips her sword tighter, the fabric of her glove straining with the motion.

The first one, obviously the leader, stands up with a grin that’s visible even from her lower altitude.

“Tell me,” he sneers as his comrades ready their weapons, “will he mourn for you?”

\---

“He’s one of the few that made no attempt to hide the fact that he was in the beta,” Kirito says, his young face grim.

Argo cuts in. “What’s more is that he was always a solo player. He never partied up with anyone.”

The boy’s dark pewter eyes gleam coldly. “The whole thing was a setup.”

\---

Karma can feel more than hear more players coming up from behind. They were probably waiting in town for a signal to come and cut off a backwards retreat. “I think he’ll be pretty proud to know that even thirty of you couldn’t take a single player down.”

“Brave words for someone in your predicament. I can respect that.” With an inviting sweep of his arm, PoH says, “Come, then. See how you fare against Laughing Coffin!”

“No, thanks. I’m not fighting a literal uphill fight, and certainly not before you let go of your hostages.” At this, he laughs, guttural and grating, and she can see smug looks being exchanged amongst his subordinates. “...You never had any hostages, did you.”

The man’s posture screams triumph as he leers down at her. “Of course not.”

Karma is silent for a few moments.

“You’re really pissing me off today, y’know,” she says deliberately, taking long, even breaths. “I’m running on about two hours of sleep from the day before that I got while trying not to freeze to death in a cave. I spent all last night tracking down some mediocre orange players when I could’ve been having a great time at a party with my friends, where it was nice and cozy and _warm_. I spent literally all of this morning saving innocent people from your stupid idiots. And now this! Do you _want_ me to fight you while I’m pissed off? Because it’s not pretty, that I can assure you.”

PoH just ignores her tirade almost completely, which does not serve to decrease her frustration at all. “You know, we’ve all heard of how you single-handedly track down orange players, imprisoning entire guilds and parties at a time. I would’ve thought you’d be a little smarter than this. Even if we did have hostages, why would you sacrifice yourself for the sake of some lower-levelled players?”

She tightens her grip on her sword. “Because it would be the right thing to do,” she says lowly, and she can feel the first strains of the song of battle starting to sing in her blood.

Slowly, PoH grins ear to ear. “Then you’ve chosen your hill to die on. We’ll announce the red dawn of a new era with the demise of our biggest obstacle. _It’s showtime!”_

\---

Even as Heathcliff stands, Karma’s HP begins to go down. Asuna can see it too, going by her stricken expression, and without another word, the two of them, already dressed in full armor, rush for the teleport gate in town. The HP bar in the corners of their HUDs is like a countdown, and as time goes by, the pace of the green fading to yellow is only increasing. The situation is nauseatingly reminiscent of when Karma was stranded from the rest of them in that underground desert dungeon.

“Hang on,” he hears Asuna mutter under her breath as they sprint through Nolfret. The HP bar is at roughly 80% now. “Hang on, Karma…”

\---

For the second time this morning, a player explodes into pixels with a cut-off shriek on the end of Karma’s sword. Before the polygons even begin to fade, she whirls around, dancing around a downward-sweeping mace and lunging in close to the wielder. He lets out a startled bleat as he tries to bring the slow weapon back around, but she drives her sword into his neck before he can even get a chance and hacks his head from his shoulders.

Her saving grace is that her level seems to be significantly higher than theirs, from fighting on the front lines and killing players. Her battle regeneration is working steadily, and although she’s still losing HP, it’s not at a rate she can’t handle. As long as she rations her HP and plays defensively, she can hold out until backup arrives.

She cries out when someone stabs her through the side with a spear, gritting her teeth at the sensation of the ice cold steel piercing through her. Reversing her grip on her blade, she stabs backwards in turn and finds a mark as she wrenches her body to the side to dislodge the spear. Someone charges her with a shield, and she launches herself towards the player, planting one foot and spinning into a kick with the other. He grunts as she kicks his shield to the side, and she drives her sword into his midsection. His HP drops heavily, and she yanks her sword out and tries to make a break for it. The gap closes quickly, though, and she skids to a stop on the balls of her feet, surrounded once again.

Her eyes flicker to her HP bar—a little over 60%. She has to find a way out of here, or at least hold out until reinforcements come. She sent the ‘safe’ message as soon as she could, and while it technically wasn’t true, it should prompt help.

Meanwhile, PoH watches safely from his vantage point, to her great frustration. “Hey, why don’t you come down here and fight instead of lurking up there like a coward?!” she barks up at him, baring her teeth fiercely.

“I won’t bother myself with a fraud like you,” he calls back, smug superiority oozing from his voice.

She scoffs. “That’s rich, coming from a murderer.”

“Aren’t you one also? Can you really claim that your hands aren’t as red as ours?”

Her grip tightens on the handle of her sword. “I never said they weren’t. But at least I’m not lying to myself about why.”

“Are you sure about that?” His mouth stretches in a grotesque facsimile of a grin. “A kill is a kill, and they all taste just as sweet. You can deny it all you want, but you know that you’re just like us.” His cloaked shoulders ripple as he shrugs. “It’s a pity you won’t join us. You would feel right at home.”

His words make her see red, and she thinks of the KoB pendant resting just under her shirt on her sternum—her reminder that no matter how much blood stains her fingers, she’ll always have a home to go to in the end.

“You’re delusional,” she snarls, “but I’ll gladly admit that your death won’t weigh particularly heavy on my conscience once I kill you.”

Suddenly, another cloaked player comes up behind PoH, whispering something in his ear. PoH gives a start of surprise, and there’s a new urgency in his voice. “Finish her, now!”

Is that fear she detects? A ruthless grin spreads across her face, because it can only mean that reinforcements are on their way.

Her grin vanishes quickly, though, as the red players attack with renewed vigor, and her HP sinks alarmingly as they attempt to mob her. With a defiant roar, she picks a weak-looking link and charges, determined to last until help arrives.

\---

They’re close enough now that they can hear the sound of weapons clashing and people shouting, and Asuna somehow speeds up even further, leaving Heathcliff behind as her form blurs slightly. He’s going to have to upgrade the game’s graphics sometime so they can render her movements properly.

Asuna cannons into one of the red players with an enraged cry, sending him literally flying. Without missing a beat, Karma ducks, letting him somersault over her head into his comrades, and she lunges, taking advantage of their distraction. At the sound of heavy armor rattling behind her, she allows herself a tight smirk and simply turns away from an incoming battleaxe aimed for her head.

_CLANG!_

Sparks fly as Heathcliff’s shield takes the attack, barely budging an inch under the assault of the heavy weapon. He sweeps his sword outwards, scoring a deep slash on the attacker’s avatar, and the three fighters reconvene, backs forming a tight triangle.

“Are you okay?” Asuna asks, breathing rapidly.

“Fine,” Karma says tensely, opening up her inventory now that she has some breathing room. She pulls out a crystal and mutters the command, bringing her HP back up.

The red players start to back away uncertainly. Karma herself already brought down three of their comrades, and she’s now backed up by two of the strongest players in the game.

“Drop your weapons and surrender!” Heathcliff calls out calmly, a steely edge in his voice. “We have more reinforcements from the clearers on the way.”

PoH’s former triumph is all but gone as he glowers down at the three red-clad figures. “You’d better watch your back,” he warns, and Karma glares right back. “The moment you let your guard down is when we’ll come for you.” A cruel grin twists his shadowed face. “Just like we did last time.”

Her hands quiver slightly at the mention of her capture—only a week, but she remembers it like it was yesterday still—and she bares her teeth with a low snarl. “Try it, I _dare_ you.”

\---

A lot of them manage to teleport away, PoH included, but they’re able to grab some of them and haul them off to prison once the others arrive. As the last of them are dragged off to the Black Iron Palace, Karma sits down hard against a piece of stone rubble with an exhausted sigh and leans back, closing her eyes briefly. Literally all she wants right now—besides maybe world peace—is to sleep.

A shadow falls over her. “Are you alright?”

She opens her eyes and gives Heathcliff a weak, crooked smile. “Were you worried?”

Instead of offering a hand up, like she expected him to, he sits down beside her. “Of course. I had just sent my strongest fighter to face a legion of player-killers who won’t hesitate to commit murder.”

Strongest fighter. She tries not to glow at the compliment (and probably fails). “I’m also a player-killer who won’t hesitate to commit murder, you know.”

“Yes, you are,” he agrees, as the sun paints the skies a soft gold, shot through with red. “And I’m glad that you are. Because you’re a good person, and I don’t want to lose you.”

_“You can deny it all you want, but you know that you’re just like us...It’s a pity you won’t join us. You would feel right at home.”_

An inexplicable rush of emotions sweeps over her, and she lets out a hoarse laugh through her nose, hugging her knees up to her chest to keep herself from hugging him instead. “Dammit, you can’t say things like that, Heathcliff.”

He tilts his head quizzically. “Why not?” he asks, sounding slightly amused and honestly confused. She shakes her head, still quivering a bit from her quiet laughter, and he asks, “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Of course I am,” she responds, lifting her chin and turning to look at him with a warm smile that she actually feels this time. “I promised I’d follow you anywhere if you believed in me. That’s a promise I intend to keep.”

A tiny smile tugs at the corner of his lips. “I’m glad to hear it,” he says quietly.

“Although,” she adds with a pout, “I can’t believe they made me miss the party.”

“It wasn’t much to be excited about anyways.”

“Coming from you, I’m inclined to doubt. Besides, I didn’t even get a chance to dance with you!”

“Such a shame,” he deadpans, and she gives him a look, which he pretends to ignore. “Are you ready to head back?”

She heaves a long sigh, resisting the urge to just lean back and take a nap right then and there. “I just wanna sleep, please.” And she know she likely won’t get a chance in at least the next twelve hours.

“Now you know how I feel.”

“Be quiet. Your sleep deprivation is, like, ninety percent self-inflicted because you’re a bloody workaholic who doesn’t know the meaning of rest.”

“That’s hardly fair.”

They get to their feet, and Karma stares silently up at the stone ruins, now bathed in the morning sunlight. A hand grasps her shoulder, and she leans slightly into his touch.

“Thanks for coming to help,” she murmurs.

“As if I had a choice.” He chuckles softly. “I think I would’ve rather faced all of those red players than Asuna-kun when she discovered it was a set-up.”

She shudders slightly when she imagines the brunette’s thunderous expression. “She is one scary lady.”

“Indeed.” He lowers his hand, and she turns to face him. “You’re going to be quite busy in the next few weeks.”

Karma inhales deeply. “I know. I’ll be ready.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And enter Laughing Coffin! Woohoo. XD
> 
> First draft was actually a short party scene, in which Karma shows up as Asuna's BFF date dressed to the nines in a suit XD But then I remembered that Laughing Coffin makes their debut on New Year's Day. I was thinking about letting them have fun that night, and then have to deal with Laughing Coffin in the morning...but I already let Karma have Christmas off, so. :)


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These chapters are getting longer and longer...The next one will be shorter. I think.

**_Reckless: 1/4/2024_ **

Karma clenches her jaw as she searches desperately for crimson and white, anything to make sure that her commander is still up and fighting. How he’s still up and fighting while the rest of them are paralyzed is beyond her.

The six-armed statue slams a sword into Heathcliff’s shield, and he skids back several meters in a shower of sparks. When she sees his HP bar plummet, her heart does the same. She redoubles her effort to get up—she fought off paralysis once before, she can do it again. He needs her help, so what is she doing just lying around like this?!

Asuna gasps in surprise when Karma suddenly flies from her position on the ground, despite the lightning bolt on her HP bar, just in time to intercept a vicious, downward strike. The strike sends her flying, but she rolls upright in an instant and charges in again, her movements more awkward and stilted than they should be. Heathcliff doesn’t show an ounce of surprise at her appearance and simply rushes in to join her, their sword skills shining like beacons of light.

A few more solid hits brings the boss down to a quarter of its last HP bar. A cold frisson of trepidation ripples through every player as its eyes flash purple.

Karma slashes deep at its ankle, eliciting an enraged howl, and she keeps running, gritting her teeth from the effort. She’s not sure how she’s on her feet, but if she stops for even a second, she feels like the paralysis will kick in again.

She skids on her knees underneath one of the six-armed statue’s blades, gasping at how close it whistles over her head, and rolls between its legs as Heathcliff blocks another sword. Suddenly-

Asuna cries out wordlessly as the monster whirls around and scores a deep, jagged slash on Karma’s back. The red-cloaked girl is sent flying nearly to the other end of the chamber as the boss lumbers after her, swords tinted purple. Desperate, the brunette checks the icon on her HP bar—the paralysis is almost gone. But a glance at the name beneath hers freezes her blood cold. Not only is Karma still paralyzed, but the last strike also put poison on her, and her HP bar is marching down towards red. If she could just _move…!_

She can hear footsteps thundering towards her, and she strains to prop up her sword underneath her. Gritting her teeth as the floor shakes with each step, she forces herself to one knee. An immense shadow falls over her all of a sudden.

In an instant, the boss backhands her, hard, and she hits the wall with a definitive _CRACK._ Her vision fuzzes black at the edges for a hot second before she hits the floor.

But a second later, the entire room becomes a shower of pixels. Kirito stands in the middle of it, sword held out in a stabbing position, as the word _Congratulations!_ appears above him and Heathcliff. The battle is over.

Karma lays her head back down on the stone floor, watching the pixels fade with a sort of detached awareness. The purple haze of the poison is overlaid by an alarming pulsating red, alerting her that her HP is in the red and decreasing.

All of a sudden, terror lances through her heart, and tears spring to her eyes as she throws everything she has into fighting the lingering paralysis. She can’t die here, she _can’t,_ not when there’s still so much left to do-

A familiar face suddenly enters her tinted vision, and the cold of the stone floor is replaced by warmth. _“...Danchou?”_

“Does anyone have an antidote?!” he barks as he picks her up.

Asuna finally is able to move, and she nearly trips in her haste to sprint over, pulling a green crystal from her inventory. “Heal!” she gasps when she meets Heathcliff halfway, and it shatters, along with the purple icon on Karma’s HP bar. Asuna nearly cries when it stops going down. What’s left of it is a tiny triangle of red in the very corner.

Heathcliff gives her a gentle shake. “Karma.”

Her eyes were scrunched shut, but she cracks them open now, and blinks, vaguely surprised to find that although her HP is still in the red, the purple has gone from her vision. At the sight of two familiar faces peering down at her in worry, she manages a weak smile, kind of bewildered, but at least she’s not going to die.

“Oh...th-thanks, Asuna, Heathcliff...That was close…” She exhales shakily. “I don’t think my HP’s ever been that low…”

“Are you okay?” Heathcliff asks, his gaze flickering to her HP bar.

She manages a small nod, her smile widening at his concern. “Yeah, just have to wait for the paralysis to wear off…”

As if on cue, or perhaps in response to the boss’s defeat, the lightning bolt icon vanishes then, and he puts her down gently. As soon as her feet touch the ground, though, her knees buckle unexpectedly, and he catches her just before she can collapse.

“W-woah…” she mutters, eyes wide as she sways on her feet, one gloved hand clinging to the edge of Heathcliff’s shield for support. “What…”

“I think you’re in shock,” Asuna tells her with a shaky smile, reaching out to put one arm around her shoulders. “It’s okay, I gotcha.”

“...I have one HP left,” Karma says aloud in a daze, staring at that number in the corner of her vision with a sort of giddy surprise. “Wow. I almost died.”

Asuna pats her shoulder with a wry grin. “Don’t worry. It’ll sink in soon.”

Karma sticks her tongue out childishly, and Asuna rolls her eyes before asking, “How did you shake off the paralysis? It was still on you until just now.”

She blinks at the question. “I don’t really know,” she admits.

“Yeah, but we couldn’t even move our arms to get a healing crystal.”

All she can do is shrug helplessly. “I mean…” She glances up at Heathcliff, and grins. “I guess I just couldn’t let the commander do all the work. Wouldn’t really be fair, would it?”

A small smile tugs at his stoic face, but the next second, her grin vanishes. “Speaking of-” She hits his armored shoulder with a fist (his HP drops a pixel or two), standing up straight now and practically radiating indignation. “What the hell?! Talk about reckless! Of all the stupid things...What were you thinking, trying to hold off a boss by yourself? If you’d just taken a second to heal even one of us, the odds would’ve been much better! I’d expect this out of Uzala, not you!”

Heathcliff ignores the snickers from some of their closer friends (and an indignant ‘hey’ from Uzala) at the sight of a teenage girl chewing out the man who just held off a boss singlehandedly for ten minutes. He just leans on his shield and sword and gives her a wry look.

“I don’t recall seeing you stop to heal anyone once you got up.”

She falters for a second, then puts her hands on her hips. “I still had the debuff! It took all of my concentration just to stay on my feet.”

Asuna is struggling to hold back a giggle, and Heathcliff just shrugs, white cloak rippling, looking unconcerned. “Well, it’s over and done now.”

Karma narrows her eyes at him, but her eye twitches, and she huffs softly, her posture relaxing. “So long as you don’t go scaring me like that again,” she says with a crooked smile. She brings her heel down on the point of her sword, which lies forgotten on the ground, to flip it into her hand. With a ‘hmph’, she sheathes the blade and adds pointedly, “But I don’t wanna hear you lecture me about ‘recklessly’ playing solo ever again.”

\---

_ 1/5/2024 _

“I want to test your ability to neutralize paralysis.”

Karma blinks slowly. “...I don’t like how this sounds.”

Heathcliff holds up three throwing picks. “These all carry the paralysis debuff. You’re going to stab yourself with one, and then you’re going to try and fight off the paralysis.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?” Asuna objects worriedly. “I mean, we’re out in the middle of the field…” “This floor is low-levelled enough for the two of us to guard her if needed. Plus, the debuff is low-duration on these, and we both have antidotes. She won’t be in any danger.”

She deadpans at his choice of words. “...Do I get a choice?”

“What do you think?”

“...Fine.” She swipes the throwing picks out of his hand and slides two of them into loops on one of her belts, holding the other one between two fingers. “I don’t know how I did it the first time, though...Here goes.”

She stabs the pick into her hand; it slides easily through the fabric of her red gloves. There’s a brief, startlingly cold sensation and a little bit of pain, and then her muscles seize up, sending her collapsing to the ground with a loud, ‘oof!’ She pauses a moment to get her figurative breath back, then starts to try and fight it.

This time, though, her muscles barely budge an inch. Her fist slowly clenches, but that’s about the extent of her abilities.

Suddenly, the local monsters of the floor start approaching, and Heathcliff motions for Asuna to take care of them, which she leaves to do in a blur of white and auburn.

“Keep trying,” he instructs Karma, who huffs in frustration but obeys.

She turns her head slightly in Asuna’s direction, glimpsing occasional flashes of her armor or hair. It was like this at the boss battle, right? She got up in order to aid her commander.

With that in mind, she tries to imagine that those monsters are deadly. That Asuna’s life will be in peril if Karma does not get up _right now!_

For all of a second, she manages to stay up on her elbows until Asuna comes to a stop in front of her. “Hey, you’re doing great!”

And then she promptly collapses again. “Ugh.”

“Oh. Sorry. Did I jinx it?”

“...Little bit.”

\---

_** Freeze: 2/11/2024 ** _

The massive war hammer leaves gaping holes in the ice and snow with each ruthless swing. The wielder is almost unreasonably fast for someone with that sort of heavy weapon.

“C’mere, you little scamp!” he growls, lashing out with a horizontal sweep.

Karma somersaults and grabs onto the shaft near the hammer head with her right hand, landing feet-first on the steel end. The wielder stumbles at the sudden additional weight, and she lunges, burying her sword up to the hilt in his shoulder.

With an outraged roar, the orange player grabs the back of her cloak and hurls her bodily into the cliff face, where she crumples to the snow with a grunt, dizzy and severely disoriented. Fortunately, she still has enough of her facilities to hear and see him charging across the snow towards her, his war hammer glowing with a sword skill.

At the last second, she leaps as high as she can, buries her sword in the rock above her, and yanks herself up with all the strength she can muster. The entire mountain seems to vibrate when his weapon smashes into it just beneath her feet like a battering ram, triggering an immortal object warning.

She kicks backwards, planting her heels into his forehead with an altered martial arts skill. While he reels backwards, significantly off balance, she yanks her sword out of the rock, braces her feet on the cliff face, and-

They both freeze when they hear a distant rumbling noise that’s not stopping, or getting any further away. Karma lands in the snow, tense. The two combatants, their instincts kicking in and warning them that there is something coming that’s way more dangerous than them, turn and look up the path, hugged on either side by sheer cliff faces.

Karma has enough time to whip out her last healing crystal and scream the command before a storm of white crashes down the path and wipes them both out.

\---

It’s so dark and cold and heavy.

By the time she’s regained her senses, she’s well and truly trapped. It feels like there’s a hundred pounds of snow pressing down on her from all sides, and she can’t move a muscle, or even clench her gloved hands. They’re so numb that she can’t even tell if she’s still holding her sword or not.

She can barely open her eyes, but her HUD displays her HP bar anyways despite the surrounding darkness, as long as her eyes are open. Thank god she used that heal crystal, which brought her back up to high green, or she would’ve been in serious trouble.

Not that she isn’t right now. She can’t grab her teleport crystal, she can’t even move. In about one or two hours, she’s going to start taking damage from the extreme cold. She prepared with cold environment reinforcements to her gear before heading out to this area of the floor (plus, there was the frigid West Mountain on Floor 55 that the front lines just cleared), so she should be able to last at least ten hours on a nearly full HP bar.

Is her quarry still alive? For a few seconds, she actually hopes he made it out of the avalanche, although it’s doubtful. But if he did, and if he intended to finish the match, he’d have to dig her out. Someone coming to help is the only way she’s going to get out, and it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen anytime soon..

Karma accepts the notion philosophically. There’s literally nothing she can do. She can’t even access her menu. The only thing to do is wait for someone to find her in time, hopefully.

She sighs.

Or, tries to.

Panic surges through her when she realizes she _can’t breathe._ Frantically, she tries to move, straining to wiggle at least a little bit, but the snow has her well and truly trapped.

Forget freezing to death, she’s going to suffocate-

But avatars don’t _need_ to breathe in SAO. The only exception to that rule is when one is underwater, and at risk of drowning. She’s had a close run-in with death by drowning before, and she’d honestly take that over this, because at least she had some semblance of control in that moment; she could still move.

She knows how long it takes for her to start drowning in water, and she counts the seconds off. Even well past the mark, she still hasn’t started taking damage, nor can she see the icon by her HP bar indicating that she’s drowning. Apparently, avatars can’t drown in anything but liquids.

God _damn_ it. She still can’t breathe.

It’s excruciating, in its own way. She doesn’t need to breathe, and yet she can’t, and it’s torturous. She can’t even black out from asphyxiation. Her chest feels tight, like her lungs are shrivelling, but her vision isn’t fading out (not that she would be able to tell in this darkness, but she can still see her HUD clearly). She’s just so used to be able to breathe that it’s nauseating to not be able to.

Oh, there’s an idea. Maybe if she makes herself vomit? Would that help? Maybe it would do something.

Several minutes later of trying to think of the most terrible, gruesome, horrible things she’s seen since SAO started, she still can’t make herself throw up or cry, and she gives up.

She gives up, and waits either for help, or for death.

\---

Shield and sword put away but ready for use, Heathcliff keeps trekking up the frigid mountains, his friends list map pulled up and tracking Karma. About ten minutes ago, Asuna messaged him to report that Karma hasn’t moved from her spot on this mountain for at least eight hours, from early in the morning to after the sun has set.

What’s especially strange is that the area isn’t even a dungeon. Karma should be perfectly capable of sending and receiving messages. Asuna apparently started messaging her after about six hours passed and she hadn’t moved, but she didn’t reply to any of them. It was the middle of the day, too, so she wouldn’t have been sleeping.

The first army is still busy exploring the new floor, so Heathcliff left by himself to go investigate. The terrain is hard to navigate, especially for someone of his build. He sinks right through the snow, making it difficult to move very quickly.

That’s strange. He pauses suddenly, surprised, and stares at the map some more. The snow isn’t supposed to be this thick so far down the path, unless he remembers wrong, and he has a near perfect memory, especially of the game he poured his soul into.

The avalanche, he realizes abruptly. They must’ve triggered the avalanche somehow, whether it was from some passing by monster or some other cause.

If that’s the case, he needs to find her, soon.

Moving slightly faster now, he homes in on her marker on the map. Sure enough, it’s just snow as far as he can see, but the marker indicates that he’s practically standing on top of her.

His fingers are already numb as he burrows through the snow urgently. Given Karma’s levels and stats, she should be able to last at least a few more minutes if she’s still alive now, but he doesn’t know precisely how long she was down here. She could run out of time at literally any second.

He hisses in surprise when red pixels slash across his hand, but he feels a surge of triumph when he realizes it was her sword that he cut himself on. Hollowing out the area around the blade and digging down, he finally encounters her arm. Her red glove is a splash of color against the blank white, and he grasps her hand with both of his and pulls.

The rest of the snow gives way with surprisingly little resistance, and he staggers back, dragging her snow-encrusted body with him. She gives a wheezing gasp, panting, and clutches at his shield with her right hand, sword gripped tightly in her left. Instantly, she whirls around, eyes glowing green with a search skill, and slowly scopes out the area, shivering violently.

Finally, the tension flips off like a switch, which he takes to mean that the area is safe, and she collapses.

\---

When Karma wakes up, it’s to the sound of a fire crackling merrily. Slowly, she pries open her eyes, blinking muzzily at the flames dancing in her vision.

A familiar face suddenly comes into her view. “Feeling better?”

“Heathcliff,” she mumbles, shifting in her seat. It’s not the most comfortable, although she realizes why when she sees that they’re in a small safe zone cave. She’s wrapped up in two thick, furry cloaks, and she tugs them closer, shivering.

“Are you cold still?” he asks.

“N-no,” she responds, confused. She really isn’t cold. But she was cold for so long, it feels almost like a reflex.

The avalanche! Her gaze snaps back to his as her memories refocus, and she sucks in a breath sharply. Just the feeling of being able to breathe alone is heaven, and to her embarrassment, she latches onto him and sobs into his shoulder, drawing in huge, gasping gulps of air as much as she can.

By the time she’s done, she feels almost dizzy for crying so hard. Heathcliff rearranged them so they’re both sitting with their backs to the wall, her tucked against his side securely.

“S-sorry,” she finally mumbles into his armored shoulder, sniffling still.

“Don’t be. I’m glad I got to you in time.”

He pulls up his inventory and hands her some rations and water, which she scarfs down hungrily. She didn’t realize how hungry she was until she remembered she hasn’t eaten since a very rudimentary, interrupted breakfast in the morning (does one cup of coffee and half a piece of bread count as breakfast?), and it’s now almost midnight.

“Do you want to teleport back to headquarters now?”

“In a bit?” She feels the need to recover a little before going back to civilization.

He just nods, leaning back. After a moment, she takes off one of her cloaks and drapes it over his shoulders backwards, like a blanket. With a sigh, he brushes some of the fur lining out of his face and readjusts it minutely.

“I hated being down there,” she whispers, eyes closed. “I was so hungry, and it was so cold, and I couldn’t move, and I couldn’t even breathe...I couldn’t breathe, but I couldn’t black out, and I couldn’t sleep either…” It was scarily reminiscent of her capture a few months ago, and she unconsciously rubs her gloved hands together, shivering again.

“I started to think I was going to die down there,” she admits quietly, her voice still thick with relief and past fear.

“You might’ve if Asuna wasn’t keeping an eye on you,” he replies with a sigh. “And don’t worry, I sent her a message already...I’ll watch your positions more often.”

“Don’t,” she protests weakly. “You don’t need to worry-”

“If Asuna didn’t check on you this morning, you would’ve frozen to death,” he says sternly. “One more pair of eyes won’t hurt when she’s busy.”

Karma gives in with a weak hum of assent. “Sorry.”

“Stop it.”

“Stop annoying you? Never…”

Heathcliff huffs in amusement, and she can practically see him rolling his eyes, eliciting a smile from her. 

“You’re okay now,” he reassures her softly. He reaches over with both arms to pull her close, and she huddles closer, still shivering, but somehow warm. “You’re alive, and we’re going to keep it that way.”

\---

_** Seeing Red: 2/25/2024 ** _

Karma pulls her cloak tightly around herself with her right hand, sword in her left, as she makes her way through the forest. According to her source, her targets should be here, grinding XP without a clue that she’s coming.

She steps carefully over a mass of twisted tree roots, her heart beating steadily in her chest. This forest is a different one—thank goodness, because raptors are not something she wants to deal with tonight—but she hasn’t been on this floor since last year, that time when she and part of what would become team B got stranded from the rest of the group.

That time when she had to order Crane to die to save the rest of them.

Suddenly, she stops in her tracks, her grip tightening on her sword...

The first bursts out of the trees with a yell, and her mind goes blank as she knocks his sword away from her head. At the same time, her ears register the sound of footsteps behind her, and she ducks as an axe blade whistles over her head. Spinning neatly, she slashes her sword across both her attackers, then lunges after the first.

For some time, she’s forced to dance back and forth between facing one or the other. The only consolation is that they’re not good teammates, so they have to switch off attacking rather than trying to overwhelm her together.

With a shout, she locks her blade against the axe head for a moment, then slides her sword straight down to chop off the wielder’s hand at the wrist, eliciting a shriek. She catches a brief glimpse of a coffin printed on the back of his glove before the hand bursts into multicolored pixels.

Twisting around, she blocks another sword strike from the sword wielder. He snarls, frustrated, and charges up a sword skill, and she smiles grimly. The system makes it easy to predict a human foe’s next movements if they use a sword skill that she’s already seen.

She easily blocks his combo of three diagonal cuts, as predicted, and rams her shoulder into his body. He stumbles with a surprised grunt, and she lops off his arm at the elbow. She’s found that it’s the easiest way to incapacitate rather than kill, since without the right hand, the menu can’t be accessed, and most people wield their weapons with their right hand too.

Suddenly, there’s an impact in her shoulder. A sickly shade of purple seeps into her vision, and she gasps, whirling around to see the axe-wielder leaping at her, dagger held aloft in his left hand. Without thinking, she smashes the dagger out of his hand with her sword, and with a hoarse shout, she plunges the tip of her blade into his throat. He reels back, and she swings her sword with both gloved hands to slice through his neck.

The feeling of cutting flesh like a hot knife through butter will never be something she can get used to.

With trembling hands, she quickly yanks out the poisoned throwing pick and pulls out a poison antidote, but the swordsman lunges at her, shrieking desperately, and she ducks under his glowing fist, sucking in a sharp breath. Whirling around on one foot, she slams her other foot into his gut and attempts to guzzle the antidote, but he attacks her again before she has the chance.

She grits her teeth as the poison drains away her HP, the green slowly marching towards yellow. At the same time, she can hear footsteps coming from far away—they know she’s here.

The man’s shriek cuts off abruptly when he bursts into pixels, and she doesn’t hesitate to chug the potion. The purple starts to clear from her vision, and she drops the empty bottle with a gasp; it sounds like gunfire when it shatters. Then she’s forced to run as more Laughing Coffin members come out of the shadows.

Her breath comes in rapid gasps as she runs. There has to be at least five or six chasing her, and her informant said there were only four total. Did he lie on purpose? Was he working with them? Was the whole point of this to lure her here so they could finish her off? If that’s the case, and if she gets out of this alive, she’s going to make him regret it.

On instinct, she skids to a stop—and narrowly avoids crashing down into a sinkhole. With a curse, she realizes that her pursuers know this forest much better than she does, and she’s already lost.

Silver flashes in her periphery, and she deflects a throwing pick with the flat of her sword and takes off running. She’ll have to find somewhere to make a stand—there’s no way she can make it out of here alive with them on her tail, not if the forest is as treacherous as another forest on this floor that she traversed so long ago.

A blur of muddy brown and black comes careening out of the bushes, and she grunts as it crashes into her. They go down in a tangle of limbs, and she kicks madly as someone’s weight lands on top of her. She sees a flash of metal, hears a triumphant yell, and with a surge of panicked desperation, she plants her feet under her attacker and heaves.

Their weight vanishes, and she lunges after them, driving a simple sword skill up their jaw. The sword aiming for her neck clatters to the ground amidst a shower of pixels, and she pushes herself to her feet and keeps running as more silhouettes crash through the trees. The one salvation is that her level seems to be much higher than theirs, which means she has a chance, even with the numbers stacked against her.

Several times along the way, she’s forced to defend herself against NPC monsters. The good thing is that it should be slowing her pursuers down too. She keeps running, occasionally fending off some Laughing Coffin attacks, but having learned from their comrades, none of them linger long enough for her to kill them.

Karma has accepted it—that if she walks out of here alive, she’ll likely be the only one who does.

It seems like her threshold of patience between aiming to maim and aiming to kill is getting lower and lower every mission. She’s not sure what that says about her.

In a shower of dust, she breaks out of the treeline into a small clear area and slides to a stop over a huge cliff, breathing rapidly. She’s not particularly scared of heights, but that drop straight down into a sinkhole still makes her stomach churn.

The bushes rustle. Slowly, she turns around to see four silhouettes step out of the trees, the moonlight glinting coldly off their weapon. She brings her own weapon around to bear, standing calmly. Her mind is crystal clear.

Karma charges forward, determined not to get pushed back for as long as possible. A spear whistles in an arc over her head as she ducks into a roll, getting in close to the wielder. Her sword plunges into the spear-wielder’s side, and she kicks him off of her blade and whirls around to parry another sword before dropping down low to kick at someone’s feet. He cries out when his comrade’s spear slashes across his shoulder, and she springs up to thrust her sword into his chest before ripping her weapon out from his side brutally to finish him off.

Her HP suddenly takes a huge hit when the mace slams into her shoulder, and she grunts loudly as she hits the ground. Rolling to regain her balance, she props herself up on one knee and blocks a heavy downward blow from an axe, gritting her teeth as she holds her sword in place with both gloved hands.

In a dissonant screech of metal, she lets the axe slide down her sword blade with a flick of her wrist and lunges up to bury her blade in the wielder’s stomach. Another slash with her sword paints a grim smile of red pixels across his throat, and one more severs his head from his neck—the easiest way, she’s discovered, to kill someone.

She quickly raises her blade again to block a throwing pick and slashes her sword through the air to deflect another one—she has no idea what kind of debuffs might be on these, and she’s not taking that chance. Spinning her sword in a pinwheel to knock another one out of the air, she lunges at the two remaining Laughing Coffin members.

The mace-wielder’s weapon flies over her head as she slides on her knees past him, and she quickly blocks a series of strikes from the spear-wielder before launching into her own attack, leaving several deep gashes on his avatar.

Suddenly, the mace-wielder comes up behind her, slamming his weapon into the dirt as she springs back. They double-team her, forcing her back step by step, and her heart jumps into her throat when she chances a look back and sees a mere two meters between her and the edge.

Orange light flashes as she draws her sword back to charge up a sword skill. She grunts as the point of the spear slices into her shoulder, but she takes the hit grimly and plunges her sword into his chest. The system takes his HP down faster than she could without it, and he bursts into pixels.

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees the mace aimed for her legs, and she backflips. Just as the mace whistles under her, she plants the toe of her boot into the man’s jaw, and he stumbles. Without hesitation, she lands and pivots behind him, hammering the hilt of her sword into the back of his head.

His scream cuts off abruptly several seconds later—presumably when he hits the bottom of the sinkhole beneath the cliff. Karma stands there, panting, adrenaline still rushing through her veins, and she stays frozen in her ready position, still expecting more foes. At last, when it seems as though there will be none, she slumps, suddenly exhausted, and scrolls through her inventory for healing items with a shaking hand. Her HP is barely hanging in the low yellow. She pulls out a potion and passes her sword to her right hand to uncork it.

Too late, her instincts scream. Even as she turns, red splashes across her vision. Her sword flies over the edge of the cliff, her right hand and glove disappearing along with it, and she chokes when she sees the point of a rapier protruding from the front of her chest.

Karma drops instantly and twists her upper body, wrenching the weapon out of its wielder’s hand with her weight. In a blur of crimson, she pulls the rapier out of herself from behind, the edges leaving thin lines of bright red on her red-clad fingers and palms, and she quickly secures her grip on the handle and hacks off his legs at the knees. She lunges after him as he tries to pull up his menu, presumably for another weapon, and she shoves the point of the rapier into his chest with a scream.

\---

Heathcliff’s expression betrays his surprise when Karma half stumbles into his office at two in the morning, one braid coming unravelled, twigs and leaves in her hair, her clothes covered in red pixels and dust, with a huge wound slowly closing on her chest. His eyes flicker to her HP bar—hanging just within the red, with the body part loss icon hovering above it.

Karma manages an exhausted, rueful smile. “Jeez...Trust you to be up this late, _danchou_ …”

He rises out of his seat, taken aback by her condition of _barely hanging on_. “Karma, what are you-”

“You wouldn’t happen to have a healing crystal on hand?...N-no pun intended,” she adds with a weak giggle, bringing what’s left of her right arm out from under her cloak.

He’s already pulled one out from his inventory. At a quick word, her HP rises back to full, the red pixels seem to evaporate off her avatar, and her hand regenerates. A quiet gasp of relief escapes her as she flexes her fingers and wrist. It’s a strange, tingling feeling, almost like pins and needles, but sadly, not one foreign to her. She quickly equips her spare pair of gloves and makes a note to get the other one’s partner replaced.

“What are you doing here so late?” he asks. If it gets this late, she typically returns from missions in the morning after spending a night in an inn.

Her brow furrows in confusion. “I...don’t know,” she admits, rubbing her regenerated hand absently. She was so paranoid coming through the forest that she sprinted through the deserted town, jumped on the teleport gate, and just went straight home. It was definitely an unreasonable reaction, but at the time, it seemed like the only thing she should do.

“I lost my sword,” she suddenly realizes, and sways on her feet.

He quickly steadies her with a hand on her shoulder. “What happened? You said-”

“He lied. There were…” Her eyes glaze slightly as she counts back. “...There were eight total. Twice as many as I was told. They were waiting for me.” She presses her fingers together to ease the trembling in them.

Heathcliff takes a deep breath, releasing her and leaning back against his desk. “You should’ve run.”

“I tried. But I didn’t know how many there were, so I didn’t think I could afford to stop and pull out a teleport crystal. And there was dangerous terrain everywhere.” Yet another thing her ‘informant’ had left out. “They knew it better than I did. I didn’t want to fall into a sinkhole because I was too busy running.”

He nods slowly, then looks at her with a serious gray gaze. “How many did you-”

She closes her eyes. “All of them.”

She didn’t have to kill the last one, though. Getting him to the Black Iron Palace might’ve been hard, since she had only one hand and he didn’t have legs. Without her right hand, she couldn’t pull up her menu to access her inventory—which is why she had to ask Heathcliff for a healing crystal. She couldn’t have gotten out a teleport crystal either, so she would’ve had to drag the man to the closest town physically, fending off monsters along the way, then drag him to the prison, all while avoiding potential sabotage from him. It would’ve been much more dangerous and more difficult. But she could’ve done it. She didn’t have to end his life.

She chances a look up, but Heathcliff isn’t even looking at her; he’s staring off into the distance with a small frown, and she mumbles, “Sorry, I know you wanted me to bring them in-”

“No, you did fine,” he cuts in, looking at her now. “Considering the circumstances, you did well to get out of there alive. Your life is worth more than the information they might or might not have given us.”

“Oh,” she sighs, her eyes struggling to stay open. All sense of urgency has left her, now that she’s back home and safe.

“You should take a break for a few weeks,” he says, and she blinks owlishly at him, his words echoing strangely in her ears. “Take that time to recuperate. And get a new weapon.”

“Wh-what? I don’t need a break-”

“Yes, you do. You were away for almost three weeks this time. You need to take some time off. Catch up with the others.”

“But…”

“That’s an order,” he adds, and she sighs.

“You should follow your own advice,” she mumbles. She wonders why the world is tilting. Maybe she’s tired. “Guess I should get some sleep…”

And she does just that, right on the spot.

This time, she’s vaguely aware, through brief moments of clarity, that he’s carrying her back to her and Asuna’s room, but she has neither the energy nor the motivation to do anything other than let him. He places her down on her bed, pulls the covers up.

She thinks she hears him say something along the lines of, “Such a troublesome thing,” before he leaves. She doesn’t think too hard on it, though.

\---

Asuna’s shriek is what wakes Karma up in the morning—along with the younger girl pouncing on Karma’s previously asleep form in an overenthusiastic welcome back hug.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were back?!” she demands. “You gave me a heart attack when I woke up and just saw something huddled on your bed!” This usually isn’t an issue, since Karma typically wakes up before her.

_“G-gomen,_ Asuna,” Karma says with a placating hand gesture, smiling weakly as she sits up. “It was two in the morning. I didn’t want to wake you up.”

“Jeez…” She hugs Karma again, this time a little gentler. “I’m glad you came back in one piece.”

Not quite…Karma doesn’t mention that, though, and just hugs Asuna back, humming softly. “I’ll probably be staying around here for a week or two before going back out.”

“You mean you’re on a break?”

“Something like that. Commander’s orders. We can hang out, if you have time.”

She thinks the orange guilds killing players are more important, but he overrode her. What a hypocrite—he never seems to take a break. Oh, well, at least she can nag him about it now. She’s half convinced he sends her on these missions so he doesn’t have to listen to her totally valid complaints about his lack of sleep.

Asuna’s ear-to-ear grin makes it worth it, though. “Yes, absolutely! Come on, let’s get ready and we can go see the others!”

Ten minutes later, Asuna throws open the doors to the common room.

“Guess who’s back!” she crows at the top of her lungs, and Karma braces herself.

What follows is a cacophony of excited yelling from the voices she’s known practically since the game started, and an all-out hug-fest. She laughs and cheers right alongside them, good-naturedly accepting her newly crushed ribs (at least, that’s what it feels like).

In another week or two, she’ll be back out in the middle of nowhere, tracking down killers. But for now, she’s going to kick back and enjoy this feeling of ‘home’ for as long as she can with the people she loves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was hesitant on the first one, because of the whole fighting off the paralysis thing. It seems overpowered, even to me...but all I can say is, it's somewhat relevant, and she's not going to be doing it often, nor can she do it in any situation. That's kinda why I added the last bit. I think I might reinforce it later. Also, I think it said somewhere that Heathcliff became the 'Man of Legend' by holding off the 50th boss for ten minutes by himself, and I tried coming up with a legitimate reason that one person would be fighting a boss by himself because I don't remember hearing a reason for it in canon. And wiki also said that Kirito got Elucidator from the 50th boss, so I put him there too.
> 
> 'Freeze' was kind of written at the last minute. I don't know if it's canon, that breathing isn't necessary in game or whatever, but I thought it might be interesting.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sigh. It's been a long week. So I'm gonna have fun by making Karma suffer :)

**_Helpless: 3/16/2024_ **

It’s comical how easy it is to plow through the monsters on the lowest floors now. Even just one hit without a sword skill is enough to kill some of the weaker ones, and using a sword skill is totally overkill.

Not for some players, though.

As the last of the mobs turn to shards, Karma finds herself in a chorus of ‘thank you’s from the low-levelled party she just rescued, and she tries to demur modestly.

“You’re a clearer, aren’t you?” asks a young man who seems to be the party leader.

“Yeah, I-”

“What’s it like to fight on the front lines?” There are stars practically shining in his eyes.

“Well-”

“Wait, that’s the Knights of the Blood Oath cross!” exclaims another party member. “You’re, like, one of the elite!”

Maybe she should’ve had Heathcliff take her off the roster again. This one was supposed to be a short hunt, so she hadn’t seen the need.

“Not every member is a combatant,” she tries. “Some are crafters, or intelligence, and they’re all important.”

“Your leader’s Heathcliff, right? The Paladin? I heard he single-handedly defeated the boss on Floor 50!”

“And its minions!”

Dammit, Heathcliff…Karma sighs, unable to hide a tiny smile. She can’t help but be a little proud.

“There weren’t any minions in that fight. He held it off for ten minutes by himself, but I know he wasn’t the one who got the last attack.” That would be that solo player, Kirito.

“Seriously, though, thank you for saving us,” the party leader jumps in again with a wide smile. He holds out a hand. “I’m Jake. That’s Henry, Alex, Crowley, and Nina.”

“Um, no problem.”

“Come on, don’t go smothering her,” Nina reprimands, planting her hands on her hips. “I have to ask, though, what’s a front-liner like you doing down here?”

Karma sheathes her sword. “I’m looking for a group of orange players. Have you heard any rumors of criminal activity around here lately?”

The party exchanges a wary look. “Well,” Jake starts uneasily, “there’ve been people whispering about a party going around and stealing things using paralysis knives...But what would they want with low-level players like us? I figured it was just a rumor.”

“Are you saying it’s real?” Crowley asks, exchanging a worried look with the other party members.

“It might be. You should be careful.”

“Well, we can’t just stop training and grinding levels!” Alex protests, clenching her fists. “Or else we’ll never make it to the front lines!”

“What’s it like anyways?” Henry asks Karma, eyes shining eagerly, and she scratches her head.

“It’s a lot of work,” she admits. “Training every day.” Which she doesn’t participate in much anymore, but she’s seen how gruelling it can be. “And now that we’re halfway through Aincrad, there’s pressure to keep maintaining our pace, but it’s hard, I won’t lie. The monster algorithms get more and more unpredictable each fight. Even the regular mobs are dangerous now.”

Heathcliff has been trying to get her to take at least one or two other players with her, but she refuses each time. The only people she could honestly trust would be clearers, and they’re needed on the front lines now more than ever as they adjust to the recent difficulty spike from Floor 50.

“Anyways,” she sighs, summoning a plastic smile at the party, “I have to go. Good luck.”

\---

Karma slinks slowly through the underbrush, sacrificing speed for silence. Her toes nudge aside any stray branch or leaf before progressing forward, ghost-like. The dark, lusterless quality of her cloak helps hide her in the shadows as she moves closer to the party. From here, she can hear their voices, though she can’t make out the words. For now, none of them seem to have noticed her watching them.

One, two, three...Seven in total, all with ombre orange octahedrons above their heads, gathered around a meager campfire. She quickly takes in their weapons and equipment—pretty average for orange players, but out of place on a low floor like this—and subconsciously starts to plan out her attack. The fast ones are always her biggest problem, able to stall her with accurate enough attacks while the others heal up. The actual planning has turned into a sort of coping mechanism, if she just focuses on the numbers and not the people embodying them.

She draws in a long breath and tenses, gripping her sword with one gloved hand and preparing to charge. They have no idea she’s coming.

In a blur, she charges out of the trees and right through their ring. Amidst the sudden shouting and cursing, she drives her heel into the ground to kick up a shower of dust and dirt over the fire, plunging them all into darkness, before lunging for the targets she marked earlier in her plans.

A rapier and someone’s hand goes flying into the night, and she kicks the unlucky person into a tree, making a note to retrieve them later. She whirls around in time to parry, spinning and weaving through their graceless attacks. It’s a full moon tonight, and she tries to keep continually getting a head count to make sure no one’s making an escape.

“Charge!”

Karma, along with all of the orange players, pivots sharply. “What the-”

Jake and his party come crashing through the undergrowth fearlessly, taking the orange players (and Karma) completely by surprise. Karma bats aside someone’s ax and demands, “What the hell are you doing?!”

“We heard shouting, so we’re here to help!”

She opens her mouth to tell them to leave when the orange players start to get over their surprise. In a flash of red, she darts in to intercept a mace heading for Alex and stabs the wielder through the stomach before shoving him into his comrade.

“You shouldn’t be here!” she barks at the green players, then she has to concentrate on the fight.

Unfortunately, while she far outmatches the orange players, they far outmatch Jake and his party. Karma’s used to having to think on her feet, knowing very well how often a plan actually goes to plan, but she’s not used to having other people on her side.

Henry stumbles back, his HP falling into the red, and she tackles his opponent to the ground, grunting when their blade stabs into her stomach. She quickly rolls to dislodge the blade, but then something hits her square in the back. As she crashes to the ground, her heart lurches as she spots the paralysis icon in the corner of her eye.

Gritting her teeth in frustration, she tries to summon whatever ability it was that allowed her to stand up at the fiftieth boss fight. Tears sting at her eyes as she struggles to even pull her sword closer to her as the chaos continues to happen around her.

At the sound of footsteps, she manages to twist her neck to see Jake charging at an orange player approaching her. He barely glances at Jake before swaying to the side, tripping the young man and sending him sprawling to the ground. A hoarse scream rips from her throat as he unhesitatingly brings his greatsword down, and Jake bursts into pixels before her eyes.

With an enraged cry, she lashes out with her sword clumsily at the orange player’s legs, but he parries easily and kicks her sword out of her hand. Her moment of freedom passes, and she’s helpless as he reaches down to drag her to her feet by the hood of her cloak.

“Poison is a handy thing, isn’t it,” he leers at her triumphantly, before driving his greatsword into her chest.

She coughs, one eye screwed shut, and her hands twitch uselessly at her sides. Her HP is dropping rapidly, even as her battle regeneration works furiously to heal her, and it drops faster as he twists the blade with a savage grin.

“I love it when the timing just works out perfectly, don’t you?” he croons, shaking her hard with a toothy grin and twisting the blade further. “Unfortunately, we don't have the mats to make it longer-lasting, but this'll do just fine. A few more seconds, and the paralysis’ll wear off, but you’ll be far too weak by th-”

Her fist cuts off his gloating, and she drops to her knees with a gasp. Grimacing as she yanks the sword out of herself, she lunges after the orange player. He whips another throwing knife out, likely another poison knife, but she pivots into a spinning kick before it leaves his fingers, then slams her glowing fist into his face again and sending him flying into the trees.

Lucky thing, she thinks to herself as she rejoins the fray with a vengeance, that she chose that skill for her last open skill slot. It shaves ten percent off the time limit of any debuff, which often isn’t much, but a little bit can go a long way _(but not enough)._

The clearing eventually falls silent save for one of the party members sobbing as Karma goes about her business, tying up the orange players and trying to block out the cries.

“I-I’m sorry.”

She freezes, looking sideways at Crowley, who clenches his fists in the hem of his cloak.

“We shouldn’t have gotten involved,” he whispers. “I-If we’d just stayed out of it…”

Karma stands there, waiting for one of them to break. To scream at her, maybe try to attack her. She expects it, but none of them do or say a thing. They just stand there, defeated.

With shaking hands, she pulls out her teleport crystals. “It wasn’t your fault. I should’ve—You-” Her voice wobbles. “You tried to do what was right.”

And they had nothing to show for it.

\---

_** Miasma: 4/5/2024 ** _

Karma jumps when she hears a knock on the door. “C-come in.”

It’s Heathcliff. “The meeting is in five minutes. Are you ready?”

It’s pouring outside. Like it was last night. She can barely see a thing.

_“Run! I’ll meet you guys there!”_

“Yeah,” she says aloud, her voice flat and dull to her own ears as she stands.

It’s been one of those days.

After stumbling into her bed at around four in the morning, soaked to the bone, she slept until ten, which still wasn’t enough sleep but she couldn’t stay in bed any longer. She got some concerned looks when she went to the leader’s office and couldn’t muster more than a shaky smile and a few weak hellos to her friends’ welcome backs.

When it became clear to all of them that she just wasn’t going to function like a human being today, they left her alone to rest, and to rebuild her ‘everything is fine’ mask. It’s taken a beating recently.

He doesn’t move at first from the threshold of her and Asuna’s room, and she stares up at him. “...Is something wrong?”

_“Don’t you dare come a step closer to us!”_

“Only what you’re not telling me,” he says, gray eyes flinty.

_“C-come back...N-no, come back…You can’t leave m-me…”_

She flinches at that, stomach churning. “Let’s just get this meeting out of the way…”

His gaze bores into her for a second, then he steps back, holding the door out for her. “We’ll talk later.”

His tone brooks no argument. All she can muster is a small nod.

Like his shadow, she trails behind him to the conference room. The skies outside are stormy and gray, not a trace of sunlight to be seen. Rain streaks down the windowpanes and casts a veil, blurring the outside view and trapping them in.

Heathcliff takes his seat at the head of the table. Karma sits down at his right side, as usual. Asuna sits next to her, and Godfree and Uzala sit across from them. The Floor map sprawls across the table in paper form, with markers here and there to indicate spots with heavy mob spawning, safe points, etc. The single red flag indicates the boss room.

She lets the others do all the talking today. For the past two weeks, the front-liners have been clearing this floor, but she’s been chasing wild geese down on the middle floors the whole time, so she doesn’t have much information to contribute.

At one point, Asuna reaches under the table to touch her knee, copper eyes concerned, and she mouths, ‘Are you okay?’

Karma opens her mouth to form words, but at that moment, a player dressed in blue and silver speaks up.

“Since we’re all here,” Lind of DDA starts, “I’d like to bring something else to our collective attention. In the past month, there have been more Laughing Coffin attacks than ever before, some against our very own guild members.” His cold gaze focuses in on Karma, who stiffens in her seat. “Karma-san, you supposedly have experience dealing with player killers. What do you have to say? You’ve been oddly quiet this whole meeting.”

Karma takes a deep, deep breath. She really does not have the energy to deal with this stupid one-sided rivalry between DDA and KoB right now, and whatever antipathy Lind has with her. Maybe it has something to do with what she said to him at that meeting when they all first heard of Laughing Coffin…

Right now, she can’t get the voices out of her head.

_“I-I’m so sorry...I swear I didn’t mean to kill h-”_

_“LIKE HELL YOU DIDN’T MEAN TO!”_

“What do you want me to say?” she asks evenly. “If you want advice on fighting th-”

“I was under the impression that these long absences you take from the front lines are to hunt down player killers,” he interrupts rudely. “That must be why you had so little to contribute today. If you’re really spending all this time fighting orange players, then perhaps you could enlighten us as to why they’re still so much of a problem.”

Heathcliff is looking at her out of the corner of his eye, and she can see it in her periphery. He doesn’t offer to step in on her behalf; he never has before, because she can always take care of herself.

She takes a deep breath, forces her tone to stay as neutral as she can make it. “I am doing the best that I can. But Laughing Coffin is not the only orange player guild out there, and I can’t be everywhere at once.”

Lind’s lip curls slightly. “You work alone, do you not? Would it not be more efficient to work with others? We front-liners have the duty of clearing the game, but surely there are mid-level players willing to help. However, you insist on taking on this task yourself. Do you not trust your fellow players? Or perhaps you wish to keep all the glory and spoils to yourself? Your so-called job has treated you well; you _are_ the highest level player in this game, after all.” His eyes narrow in smug derision. “But I hardly think that we can or should allow your pride to continue to get others killed.”

Karma’s face doesn’t so much as twitch. It’s Heathcliff’s expression that flickers, because under the table, Karma’s hand is locked so tightly around his own hand that if this was the real world, she would’ve surely crushed the bones to dust.

Heathcliff says something, she’s not sure what. The artificial heartbeat pounding in her ears is too loud to hear much of anything. As the others begin to file out of the conference room, she lets him lead her through Granzam, one light hand between her shoulder blades.

He sits her down at the table in the kitchen, and she blinks when he sets a cup of coffee down in front of her and sits down next to her with his own cup. Reflexively, she cups her hands around the mug, and she realizes it has marshmallows in it, something she experimented with last Christmas.

She looks up at him into his steel gray eyes, but it’s a different kind of gray than the dull, oppressive storm clouds drenching the world outside. In the midst of the emotions churning in her stomach, she finds a voice, small and miserable.

“They were so young.”

_“Hey, you’re Karma, right? We were sent to help you!”_

_“We’ve been living here for a while, so we know the fields around here like the backs of our hands.”_

_Hands interlocked, thick as thieves._

Tears bubble up in her eyes as she covers her mouth with her red-clad hands. “I didn’t mean to…”

_“We just started junior high together in real life before SAO.”_

_“Yeah, it’s always been just us, so we stick together!”_

She draws a deep, shuddering breath. “It was raining...I couldn’t see anything, and I…”

_“So what’s high school like, Karma?”_

“Baka! _It’s rude to ask about people’s real lives, you know!”_

_“It’s okay, I don’t mind...It’s different from junior high. People start caring more and more about what everyone else thinks. I’m sure you two will be alright, though.”_

_“Of course we will!”_

“They think I _want_ to do this? They think I _like_ killing players?” She whimpers, buckling beneath the weight of her own crimes, and the evidence of them in the form of her level blinking tauntingly at her on her HUD—89. No monsters drop as much experience as a high-levelled player.

_“Karma, have you ever killed someone?”_

_“Yes. I have.”_

They can have all of her levels, all of the equipment drops, all of the col she gets when she sells them, and they can have this misery too.

“I never wanted this,” she spits out, her voice cracking.

_“...Do you ever get used to it?”_

_“Never.”_

“I hate what I do,” Karma sobs hoarsely; the miasma builds up in her, a festering cesspool of guilt and shame and everything in between.

_“Does it hurt?”_

_“Of course. But I don’t want it to not hurt. I need it, to feel like I’m still human.”_

Slowly, he lifts a hand to rub her back, calm and collected in the face of her storm, and she drops her head onto his shoulder, crying, “I don’t want to do this anymore!”

_“So maybe that’s why…”_

_“See, we have each other. So we don’t need the guilt.”_

He lets her cry. He lets her scream and sob and weep into the shoulder of his immaculate robe. When there’s no more air in her lungs, nor tears to cry, she hiccups and snuffles, trembling like a wind-blown leaf—insubstantial and powerless. It is only then that he speaks.

“If you don’t think you can do this anymore,” he starts softly, “then I won’t make you. I can’t send you out there again if you don’t have the resolve you need, because you would only be risking your own life.”

Karma takes a deep breath, resting her head a little more securely on his shoulder, and she wipes her eyes with the heels of her hands and a sniffle. Her tears seep into the red fabric of her gloves, leaving dark spots and blotches.

What changed, really? She never did want to do this. At first, he just needed someone for the job and she was there, conveniently equipped with a passable skillset and past experience. Over time, her fighting skills became tailored to her job. Her experience made her even more dangerous. She threw herself into her work, knowing it needed to be done.

She has _always_ hated what she did, because for every few orange players she can throw into the Black Iron Palace alive, another’s figurative blood coats her blade and her hands.

So what’s changed? Is she just getting weaker? She can’t tell.

So she asks the one player who has always, always had an answer: “Do you think I’m strong enough?”

His response is swift, unhesitating. “Always.”

The others find them in the kitchen five or ten minutes later, and Karma can’t help but smirk a little at Uzala and Asuna, who burst through the door ranting quite loudly about Lind and his moronic tendencies and his big head and everything else in between. Meanwhile, Godfree pours himself some coffee and slides into the seat across from Karma.

“You should’ve seen that guy’s face when we chewed him out in private earlier,” he says with a conspiratorial wink, but his face is still creased with concern. “You alright?”

She swallows hard, but this time, the lump in her throat is from something different—the overwhelming, unconditional support that she’s getting from her family and that she absolutely does not deserve. “I’m alright.” If she’s not careful, she might just start blubbering again.

He smiles kindly, like an older brother or father might, and reaches over to pat her hand, eliciting a small smile. “Are those marshmallows?”

“They’re on the top shelf, if you want some.”

“Hell yeah.”

Heathcliff rubs his forehead in exasperation. “Good grief.” He sounds personally wronged by what they’re doing to their coffee.

Uzala, apparently done ranting for the time being, wanders over to the coffee pot hopefully. “Any more left?”

Godfree slurps at his coffee pointedly. “Nope.”

“Well, screw you too. Guess I’ll make some more.”

Karma’s lips twitch, and Asuna pipes up, “Make some for me too.” She throws herself down into the seat on her other side, copper eyes glittering viciously. “Honestly, if the commander didn’t give him a verbal beatdown in front of everyone, we would’ve thrown hands over the table.”

Karma does a double take, and she looks at Heathcliff. “What?”

He rolls his eyes, hiding behind his coffee mug, and Uzala sits down next to Godfree after shooting the other man’s coffee a covetous look. “You didn’t hear him?”

“No,” she admits. She didn’t hear much of anything near the end.

“Oh, come on, you missed out!”

By the time they’re done recounting what exactly Heathcliff said, Karma is hiding her giggles in her coffee mug. “So chivalrous, all of you. I’m honored.” She is, she truly is; they’ll never fully understand how grateful she is for them.

Uzala turns around from the coffee machine with a steaming mug of coffee, scowling. “That rat bastard deserved it. He doesn’t know crap.” To punctuate his statement, he takes a big gulp of coffee and immediately spits it into the sink. “Hot hot hot hot hot!”

Asuna rolls her eyes, lips twitching. _“Baka.”_

For the first time today, Karma smiles, but it fades quickly when her gaze falls back down to her coffee, and the bits of marshmallow swirling at the bottom.

\---

“Sometimes, I feel like you forget something.”

Karma stirs briefly, glancing up at Heathcliff. It’s currently almost midnight, and they’re sitting in his office again. “Forget what?”

“You _can_ call on us for backup if you need to,” he states slowly, his expression serious.

She stiffens in her seat. “No,” she whispers, shaking her head. “You need all the players you can get on the front lines, now that we’re past the halfway mark.” Which should’ve felt like a victory, but it’s been harder than ever to keep making decent progress, especially with the difficulty spike. “I’ve been fine on my own. No need to change what works.”

“There’s going to be a time when that _won’t_ work, and I’d rather we not find out through trial by fire-”

She cuts in sharply.

“You don’t know what it feels like,” she snaps, a tight feeling squeezing her lungs. “And I don’t ever want any of you to know what it feels like.”

Lind might not know anything about her, but really, how much more do her friends know? She doesn’t talk about these things for a reason. She almost never has company on her assignments, and this past one is nothing but a bitter reminder of why.

Even Heathcliff hears only brisk, informative, objective retellings from her. She tells him about the towns she goes to, the people she talks to. How many orange players she has to face. How many she managed to put in prison. How many occasionally get away. How many die on the end of her blade. Just numbers and places and names.

She doesn’t tell him about the anxiety prickling along the back of her neck that always lurks in the back of her mind when she enters a town, wondering if she’s being watched. The creeping suspicion that makes her wonder if she’s being duped sometimes. The writhing nerves inside her when she sees the ombre orange octahedrons. The sensation of her stomach dropping as she does a head count and often finds more than expected, no matter what she was told or how realistically she set her expectations. Or when she does a head count and finds less than she expected, and her paranoia kicks into overdrive, wondering where the others are _(are they sneaking up behind her are they preying on other players are they going after her friends?)_. The tight feeling in her chest when she hears the teleport SFX, knowing they might be back to get revenge—maybe by ambushing her, maybe by going after her friends and family—if she doesn’t find them first.

She doesn’t tell him about the guilt either. The kind that can be all-consuming if she doesn’t keep putting one foot in front of the other. The kind that eats her alive every time she sees the enraged, horrified, anguished faces of comrades of the fallen, because most of them are still _some_ kind of human, and they can still feel loss. The kind that she gives in to when she’s alone in a dingy inn bathroom, bent over the sink with hands clinging to the cracked porcelain counter, staring numbly at her vomit because she can’t bear to look in the mirror at her sorry self.

She doesn’t tell Heathcliff any of that. She sure as hell doesn’t tell the others either.

But they’re not stupid. They might not know what it feels like firsthand, but they know what she’s done behind the scenes. And they’ve only ever accepted it, ever since the beginning, a whole year ago. They might not know the details, but they know there’s blood on her hands, and they’re okay with it anyways. Maybe she can learn to be okay with it too.

And if she can’t, she’ll learn to fake it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ha! I told you this chapter would be shorter! XD
> 
> I made up the ability I gave her in 'Helpless'. She still can't break the debuff at will, but I figured with her past experiences with poison, she might want to have something like that.
> 
> I hope the whole soloing thing makes at least a little sense. It's partly because 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it', partly because she's had bad experiences with working with others in situations like those, partly because the only people she really, truly trusts are people that are needed on the front lines, and partly because the front lines do need all the blades they can get now that they're halfway through Aincrad.
> 
> I've been sitting on 'Miasma' for a while, actually, and I've just been editing it here and there. So what do you think happened? I left it a little vague on purpose.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, I had this written and forgot to go back and edit it, hehe...These two happen one right after the other, by the way.

**_Bodies: 6/17/2024_ **

“Squad A, move in! B, fall back! It’s almost down to one HP bar!”

At Asuna’s orders, white-clad players move like a well-oiled machine, and the Rotting Fodder screeches as swords and spears and axes bite into its dessicated gray skin and tattered black suit. Karma rushes in to bring up the back and deals one last blow to its side before the second-to-last HP bar winks out, and it staggers back, howling.

“Be careful! Watch out for new attack patterns!” Heathcliff barks, and Karma leaps back to his side, sword held aloft warily.

The undead boss stabs its spade into the loamy ground and lets out a long, nails on chalkboard wail. Karma swears she can see its yellowed teeth rattle as its eyes roll back in its gaunt face.

The dirt writhes in certain spots, causing some to jump back with startled yelps, and Karma mutters, “Minions?”

But minions always appear at the beginning of a fight. There’s no more time to wonder before they burst out of the dirt, however, because the... _things..._ are amassing an army.

Folds of decaying skin and hollowed eyes face them. No one cares anymore _why_ they’re here now, only that they are, and they’re wearing very familiar faces. A cold frisson cuts through the players, descending over them like a fog and sending each and every one of them into a dead (no pun intended) silence.

Standing before them is an army of walking corpses, wearing the armor, gear, and faces of deceased players, and purposefully constructed scars from the ways they died.

A crimson blur lunges from the mass of shell-shocked clearers with a defiant shout, and a handsome, sunken face framed by cyan hair barely blinks before it explodes into shards.

“They’re not players!” Karma shouts, voice cracking slightly. “They’re just warped avatars without sentience! We can’t hesitate to kill them!”

She lunges for another player whose face she only vaguely recognizes, cutting him to shreds with mechanical ease. After all, it’s only a monster’s AI in a human-shaped skin.

She knows that the other players know she’s right. But too few are going to be able to follow through in tearing former comrades to pieces when they’ve already seen those faces contort in surprise, in fear, in anguish before bursting into pixels right in front of them.

A living player screams as he’s bifurcated by a huge battleaxe, shattering into pixels. Moments later, the pixels reconstruct, climbing over each other in a frenzy to somehow reform the player—this time with zombie-like features and a huge, gory slash mark down his middle, still fresh and raw. The undead avatar lunges at his horrified friends-

-only for Karma to rip into him, driving her sword with both hands through his chest before decapitating him and swinging back around to kill the first one. Everywhere she looks, she can see players backing away from the corpse minions, stricken with terror and disgust as the less fortunate, slower ones are mauled and turned, for lack of better word.

This is her fight, she reasons, leaping at another corpse without a backwards glance. She’s the player-killer here. This should be her job. She’s the one used to leaving red pixels on human avatars, who’s used to feeling the bite of her sword in their artificial bodies. She should be the one to bear this burden-

_Oh._

Her step falters at the sight of a pale, wispy girl with glassy, dazed eyes and a knife in hand, acid burns scarring her skin grotesquely. Stella’s body lunges at her, and Karma barely manages to parry, dancing backwards with a sharp gasp as the knife flashes like a snake’s tongue, faster than it ever did in the hands of the living.

She can do this. She has to do this. She should be able to do this, so—so-

Before Karma can drive herself to kill Stella—no, her avatar, damn it—a white and auburn blur shoots past her in a flash of green light and an anguished scream. The reanimated, marred avatar bursts into pixels on the end of Asuna’s slim rapier.

Karma bites the inside of her mouth hard, trying to swallow the massive lump in her throat, and rushes past Asuna. “Go target the boss! I’ll handle the rest!”

And she does, sweeping through ranks of festering gray skin, dilapidated gear—the occasional fluttering, torn white cape and rusted red-lined, cross-emblazoned armor.

\---

The boss chamber falls silent eventually. One would think that summoning the minions would leave the boss weakened, but its defenses only got harder to chip away at in the end. Despite all of that, the minions outlasted the boss—mostly because there were so few people fighting them.

The tip of Karma’s sword sinks slightly into the squishy dirt. How many player corpses did she kill? It feels like all of them, except Stella. The thought leaves her light-headed and dizzy, feeling insubstantial. Taking a look around, her stomach sinks through her feet when she sees how many they have—too few.

Asuna is sitting boneless on her knees next to her quasi-friend Kirito, pristine white robes muddy. The moody, reserved, black-clad loner looks just as shaken as everyone else. She sees Heathcliff standing a few meters away near some other KoB members slumped on the floor against each other. He looks to be doing the same thing as Karma—counting up the casualties.

They make eye contact, and Karma takes a step towards him on numb legs before all of a sudden, black rushes up to engulf her vision.

\---

She wakes up with a message alert blinking at her in the corner of her HUD. This isn’t an unusual occurrence, and she opens up the message as she gets out of bed. She’s in her room in Granzam Castle, it looks like.

It’s from Heathcliff. _[I hope this finds you well-rested. Come see me when you wake up.]_

Karma frowns to herself, wracking her brain for her memory. She remembers her vision going black for some reason...Did she pass out? From what?

She’s still dressed in full gear, she realizes, and then it comes back to her. She sways alarmingly on her feet and blinks, her heart squeezing almost painfully. The pressure of a headache begins to build behind her eyes, and she presses the heels of her hands into her eyes and squeezes them shut, trying to take deep breaths and focus on the soft fabric encasing her hands.

So, it did happen.

There’s another message from Asuna, saying that she’s at dinner with the others in the city—a sort of mourning ritual where they toast the fallen. Karma should be there. She knew some of the players who died, and for once, not just as names and faces read off a roster in passing or something. She killed some of them when they got back up.

She unequips all of her armor and lets her hair down, but she doesn’t have the energy to put it back up and just lets it bristle and bush, as it does when it’s loose. Instead of going down the staircase towards the ground floor, though, she goes up.

However, she doesn’t find Heathcliff in his office, which is strange. Did he go to dinner with the others, for once? A quick use of the tracking app in the friends menu shows that he’s still in the castle; unfortunately, the map doesn’t get much more specific than that. But the halls are mercifully empty as she wanders them, taking her sweet time in looking.

After about half an hour, she finds him sitting in the kitchen, nursing a cup of coffee, as usual. He’s not wearing his usual robes; instead, he’s wearing the black shirt and pants that he wears underneath all of his armor, and no shoes. He looks surprisingly _chill,_ which brings a tiny smirk to her face. Wordlessly, he holds out another full cup of black coffee to her, and she takes it with a tired hum of appreciation as she sits down next to him. The heat seeping through her thin gloves is soothing, and the last vestiges of the setting sun come in bars through the vertical blinds.

Minutes pass by. Karma’s not sure how many. Suddenly, he says, “Turn around.”

She does so, and feels his deft fingers running through her tangled hair, startling her, and he pauses, having evidently detected her surprise. “Do you mind?”

A faint smile crosses her face, and she takes a sip of coffee. “No, go ahead.” She and Asuna used to do each other’s hair in the early days of the game as a sort of comfort routine, but no one else has done her hair since she was in grade school.

“So this is why you keep it tied up all the time,” he mutters, picking apart knots with meticulous attention.

She huffs quietly in amusement. When she feels him part her hair, she finally asks, “Are you trying to braid my hair?”

“I’d like to think I’m more than just trying,” he replies dryly. “I do know how this works.”

It takes him a few tries, actually, but neither of them have places to be. Well, actually, they should be at dinner with the others, honoring the memories of the fallen, but they’re not going to tonight. After about ten minutes, he ties off the second braid with a sigh; as she turns back around, he tucks a stray strand behind her ear.

“Thank you,” she mumbles. It amuses her a bit when she runs her braids through her gloved hands—a little lopsided, and too loose or too tight in some places. Even he’s not perfect at everything he tries.

“You did well,” he tells her, and she swallows hard. “When the minions appeared, I was sure we were going to lose more. You cut most of them down before they could do too much damage. I know you don’t take pride in what you do, but you did a lot of good today.”

But not enough. “Compared to other boss battles, it was a slaughter,” she whispers, not bothering to hide the horror she can’t shake.

“It was inevitable. We can’t go the rest of the game without losing people in boss raids, and it’s going to happen again.”

“I know that. It was just cruel…” For the dead, dessicated faces of former comrades to be the last thing they saw…

“It was cruel,” he agrees quietly. “But that’s life. Everyone has demons, and the worst appear as friends.”

She looks at him with a humorless half-smile. “Who hurt you?”

He just gives her an identical blank smile, and she leans into his side cat-like, resting her head on his shoulder.

“I miss them,” she admits softly, biting back the sting in her eyes when she thinks of all the faces she saw, if only for a few seconds. “I know they’re not coming back…” She rubs at the droplet sliding down her cheek and sniffles. “I wanted to talk to them. I don’t know what I would’ve said…” Her throat tightens, and she squeezes her eyes shut, more tears trickling down her face. “But seeing them like that…they felt further away than ever.”

He leans his head against hers quietly. “Do you ever dream about seeing them again?”

Karma sniffles, curling her fingers around his. “No.” She’s not sure whether to be glad about that or not. “Probably a good thing,” she forces herself to admit.

A moment passes. Heathcliff sighs, wistful and lonely, with a touch of sorrow and a dash of regret. “Probably.”

She already knows how much it hurts, being unable to act while her friends and family get torn to pieces over and over and over again. (Maybe that’s why Heathcliff doesn’t sleep, which is part of why she still sleeps, so she can rub it in his face and tell him to sleep without sounding like a hypocrite.)

It’s familiar territory. What would happen if she went to sleep and saw them again, but it wasn’t just grief? It would just be...weird. And whatever happened wouldn’t be real. The nightmares are real enough, because they always show what has already happened, or what might happen. Anything different would be wishful thinking, and none of them have any time for that.

Speaking of dreams, she yawns widely, still exhausted, and Heathcliff says in mild exasperation, “You just had a nap and a cup of black coffee.”

“You are warm,” she counters sleepily. She curls up her legs underneath her on the chair, and her knee is digging into the side of his leg, but he doesn’t say a word.

Later, Asuna comes looking for them, and finds them both in the kitchen. She can’t help but smile when she sees her roommate curled up, fast asleep next to the stoic, straight-faced guild commander reading the newspaper. Her hair is braided, but it looks a little too messy and off-kilter to be her own work. Maybe her exhaustion made her clumsy, but it never has before.

Heathcliff looks up at the brunette’s appearance and makes a ‘shh’ gesture. Asuna mimics the gesture as a sign of compliance, still smiling. She watches him put down the newspaper carefully so that it doesn’t rustle before picking up Karma with utmost care. He cradles her sleeping form as if she is a glass statue, even though he knows better than anyone that she is anything but.

Asuna’s smile doesn’t waver all the way back to the girls’ room. She helps him tuck Karma into bed; it proves surprisingly easy. When they’re camping out in the field, you can barely touch her without waking her up, no matter how exhausted she is, which, Asuna supposes, goes to show how secure she feels.

“Thank you,” she whispers to Heathcliff, and he just nods, gaze lingering on his right hand’s peaceful expression, before taking his leave.

\---

_** A Day Off: 6/24/2024 ** _

The door flies open. “You really pulled another all-nighter, didn’t you.”

Heathcliff levels a stern look at Karma, though the effect is somewhat mitigated by the tiredness in his expression. “Karma, not now.” Avatars can’t have bags under their eyes or other related symptoms, but Karma doesn’t need that to see that he hasn’t slept since god knows when.

He reaches for one of the two cups of coffee in her gloved hands, but she steps back with a stubborn glare. With an exasperated sigh, he rubs the bridge of his nose.

“Need I remind you how the last boss battle went?” he asks expectantly.

She lets out a long breath. “You know you don’t.”

“We won, but we can’t afford to rest easy now. I can’t-”

“You have to,” she says quietly, lifting her chin with a hard stare. At this point, she’s honestly a little fed up.

Uncharacteristic irritation sparks in his gaze. “Karma-”

“I don’t care if you’re my boss. Well, actually,” she amends with a pointed tilt of her head, “that’s why I care. The others finally convinced me that I need a break, too.” And wasn’t that a fun conversation. So if she had to go through that, she’s putting Heathcliff through it too. “So after we finish whatever it is you have to do today, we’re going out with some of the others tonight to have some fun.” She puts one cup of coffee down on the desk. “No arguments.”

Almost hesitantly, she reaches over his desk to touch his shoulder, eliciting a startled blink. “I’ve told you before, you don’t have to do this all by yourself,” she says quietly.

With a flourish of her cloak, she grabs the chair _(her_ chair, really) and brings it around the desk to sit down next to him. “Now gimme that map. God knows I can probably get this done way faster than you can, given I got about eight more hours of sleep than you did.”

He takes a breath to protest, but she cuts him off with a deadpan stare and, “Map. Now,” before he can say a word.

He gives her the map.

Just then, someone knocks on the door; before Heathcliff can say anything, she says cheerfully, “Come in!”

Uzala and Godfree walk in, and both of them break into grins as Uzala remarks, “Huh. Looks like you never needed any backup.”

She crosses her arms with a smug look. “Did you ever doubt me?”

“We shouldn’t have,” Godfree laughs jovially.

Heathcliff sighs, apparently resigned to his fate. “...Who else is coming?”

Karma beams triumphantly, kicking her feet under the desk in a little happy dance. “Everyone from way back. Kili, Muldar, Fultz, and Asuna are all coming, and those two. Don’t worry, you’ll be in good hands! We spent all of last night planning it out.”

“Well, I’m certainly glad that some of my most important officers have been spending valuable time planning a frivolous, unnecessary-”

She whacks him over the head with a few rolled-up papers, eliciting explosive guffaws from the two sub-leaders. “I will hurt you.”

\---

Karma hops off the teleport gate with a grin. “So I was here just last week! Nice little town, don’t you think? And there’s this super cute little bar we’re going to later.”

All of them are dressed casually for the outing, which means different things for all of them. None of them are wearing armor or anything that screams ‘KoB’, although Heathcliff apparently couldn’t find anything else except the black long-sleeved shirt and pants he wears under his armor. With the exception of Heathcliff’s massive tower shield and sword, which is in his inventory, they all have their weapons equipped, but that’s a given in SAO.

“We are not getting drunk,” Heathcliff warns. Karma laughs in his face.

“Tell that to them,” she snickers, glancing pointedly at the older guys, who promptly burst out into appropriately offended exclamations.

Asuna rolls her eyes at them and claps her hands together with a smile. “Anyways, you don’t have to worry about that right now, ‘cause we’re eating dinner first. Let’s go!”

“Oh, one more thing before we go,” Karma adds, and Heathcliff blinks when she points accusingly at him. “No talking about work-related stuff today!”

\---

“...When you said no talking about work-related things, I didn’t think we’d be talking about-”

Karma makes a shushing motion at the exasperated leader sitting next to her. “Shut up, I wanna hear this! This is funny!”

“This is stupid,” Asuna says from Karma’s other side, grinning. “But also really funny.”

Muldar and Fultz are locked in an intense argument, a verbal battle to the death. Each set of spectating eyes goes back and forth, willingly or not, between the contestants as they duke it out, as if they’re all watching a tennis match between world-class players.

“Okay, but look at this,” Fultz says, pointing passionately at his half-eaten sandwich, with the top piece of bread taken off. “It’s still a sandwich, right?”

“Well, yeah, but-”

“So what makes it a sandwich still? If this is still a sandwich, would a pizza be a sandwich?”

“What—a pizza is definitely not a sandwich. You can’t just take the ingredients off without ruining the integrity of the ingredients.”

“...Fair. But what about a wrap? Or a burrito? Are those sandwiches?”

“Dude, a sandwich is a sandwich!”

“But what is the definition of a sandwich?”

“Oh, god. Next thing you know, you’re going to be saying hot dogs and tacos are sandwiches too…”

“Okay, wait, a hot dog is definitely a sandwich, end of story.”

“End of story? I think not, prove it!”

“How is a hot dog not a sandwich?! It’s literally two pieces of bread with stuff inside, that’s basically a sandwich!”

“You’d think they were drunk, and it’s sad that they’re not,” Heathcliff deadpans, and Karma laughs, tears springing to her eyes. “This is a complete waste of time.” “You love us all anyways,” she says confidently, grinning so wide her cheeks would hurt if this was real life. “This was a good thing. You spent way too much time in that office.”

“Because I have to.”

“It’s counterproductive.”

“So is wasting time arguing about what a sandwich is.”

“You are such a buzzkill. We got all that work done, didn’t we? So no complaining.”

“You two bicker like an old married couple,” Uzala snarks at them, and Karma claps her hands together with a half-startled shriek of laughter and nearly falls out of her seat, much to Heathcliff’s exasperation.

“They practically _are_ an old married couple,” Godfree adds, grinning.

“Hey, the old married couple at this table is those two, are you kidding me?” Karma snorts, gesturing at the two adults who are squabbling over the definition of a sandwich.

Kili laughs with a grin of his own. “Uh, more like stubborn grade-schoolers bickering on the playground during recess. I’m not sure if old married couples argue so much over the definition of a sandwich...Didn’t you guys actually get married at one point, though?”

Karma gasps, grinning at the memories. “Oh yeah! That one time the two of us got stuck in that anti-crystal dungeon!”

_“Karma, toss over the relic!”_

_“Uh, I’m a little busy over here with these little minions!”_

_“Can you put it in the guild inventory?”_

_“Again, a little busy!...What’s this?”_

_“Just click accept!”_

She sighs fondly. “The advantages of shared inventory...But man, item allocation was a pain to sort out.”

Heathcliff actually rolls his eyes at her and opens his mouth to respond, but then dessert arrives. Even Muldar and Fultz shut up for a minute.

Uzala shovels a piece of his cake into his mouth. “Hey, cake versus pie?”

“Oh my god, why,” Asuna groans, facepalming, but it’s way too late.

“Pie,” Godfree jumps in immediately, a slice of cherry pie sitting in front of him. “Definitely better than glorified bread.”

Uzala slams one hand into his chest with an exaggerated expression of offense—and immediately begins choking. “Cake—better—totally—ack—mutiny by cake—help-”

Karma rolls her eyes and elbows Heathcliff lightly. “What’s your take, _danchou?”_ she asks teasingly. She’s not expecting him to join in, which is why she’s utterly shocked when he steeples his fingers and says:

“I’d vote for pie.”

Everyone turns to stare open-mouthed at Heathcliff (not really at his actual opinion, more at the fact that he _has_ an opinion), who shrugs. “Pie is much more versatile than cake, and it always takes more hard work. You can buy cake mix and just put it in the oven, but you have to make a pie by scratch, no shortcuts.”

For a second, they all just stare at this unexpected new contender. Then:

“But if you screw up a cake, you can always fix it later,” Kili argues back. “If you mess one thing up in a pie, you’re screwed.”

“That’s the beauty of it,” their guild leader counters, and Uzala swallows hard, red in the face but triumphant against the mutiny of his cake.

“You can’t decorate pie like you can with cake, though,” he argues, voice hoarse, determined not to be defeated by his own delectable dessert, and he gestures emphatically at his half-eaten cake. “And you can make cakes in all kinds of shapes and sizes. You ever seen a pinata pie? Yeah, didn’t think so.”

“When it comes to food, presentation doesn’t matter so much as the taste,” Godfree argues back, slamming a hand down on the table passionately. “And you can’t beat the crumbly, crusty deliciousness of pie fresh out of the oven, especially not with some fancy whipped cream drizzled over a chunk of bread!”

“Why you-”

Meanwhile, as the argument continues, Asuna leans over to Karma. “I can’t believe you got the commander into this.” Both girls are quite content to spectate.

Karma lets out a high-pitched giggle, grabbing her cup of coffee. “Me neither, and it’s awesome.”

The door suddenly flies open, and a player stands in the threshold, looking desperate. “Someone please help! Our party got ambushed out in the field, and I don’t know how much longer they can hold out for!”

The eight of them immediately jump to their feet, and Karma grabs the player on her way out the door, nearly dragging him off his feet. “Which way?”

“Should we equip our armor?” Kili asks as they sprint through the streets, getting several weird looks along the way.

“We’re only on Floor 19, we should be fine. Just don’t let your guard down.”

For a second, the only sound they can hear besides a general hubbub of the crowds is their drumming footsteps. Then:

“But you don’t eat pie at parties, do you? Cake is way better for a celebration!”

“No way! Party cakes always have way too much frosting. Pie is way better, and you can eat it at celebrations and in everyday life!”

“Are you seriously still debating pie versus cake when we’re trying to save people here?!” Asuna explodes, and Uzala and Godfree wisely shut up. The others stifle laughter.

Once outside the safe zone, they crest a small hill and see the setting sun glinting off of light armor of players down below, struggling against the sheer numbers of their foes.

Heathcliff inhales to give the orders, but Karma suggests, “Why don’t I take this one?”

After a moment, he chuckles softly and draws his sword. “Knock yourself out.”

A grin stretches across her face, and she charges in, her oldest comrades by her side.

“Godfree, Uzala, Muldar, Heathcliff, get in front and give them some room to breathe! The rest of us will flank from the sides. Asuna, you’re with me on the right; Kili and Fultz, you’re taking their left. Let’s go!”

After the battle…

“Hey, you okay, man?” Uzala asks, helping one player to his feet.

“Yeah, thanks for the assist…”

“No problem. So, cake is better than pie, right?”

“Huh?”

Karma bursts out laughing for the millionth time that day at Asuna’s epic facepalm.

\---

“Whoo, time to get smashed!” Uzala whoops loudly as they enter the bar.

“Why did I agree to this again?” Heathcliff mutters under his breath, but Karma hears him.

“Because you knew deep down that I was totally right,” she says smugly. “So come on, let’s have some fun! And in the morning, we can laugh at them and their hangovers.”

“...I’m not opposed to that.”

“Aww, I knew you’d come around.” To everyone, she says, “I’ll go get us some drinks. What d’you guys want?”

While she’s waiting for the NPC bartender to mix their drinks, a voice remarks from next to her, “Didn’t know there were girls in the Knights of the Blood Oath.”

She glances over to see a very mildly attractive young man and his friends sitting next to her. “Well, there are,” she says politely.

He nods, grinning at his friends before saying appreciatively, “Yeah, I like the tough girls. How about I buy you a drink?”

She narrows her eyes, unimpressed. He’s definitely had a few drinks already. “Sorry, I’m here with some other friends.”

He scoots closer, still grinning. “Aww, don’t be like that. Whatever you like, my treat.”

She darts a glance to see if the bartender is done yet, but he’s taking his merry time. “No, thank you.”

His friends fan out a bit, and she stands instinctively as they start to surround her. “You KoB are all so stuck-up,” one of them says, wrinkling his nose. “Bet you’re all just talk.”

Meanwhile, at the table, Asuna catches a glimpse of Karma and scowls. “Losers.” She stares pointedly at Heathcliff. “Go bail her out!”

“Why? She can take care of herself.”

“You’re her boss.”

“...Exactly. Not her boyfriend,” he says, seemingly mystified.

Godfree hoots with laughter, and Uzala cackles, “Imagine that!”

Poor Kili looks scarred for life. “Uh, I’d rather not!”

Asuna levels an unimpressed look at Heathcliff. With a ‘hmph!’, she flounces off to go rescue Karma herself, practically elbowing the jerks aside. “Hey, no means no, losers.”

The bartender sets a tray down with the drinks, and Karma reaches for it. However, the first boy actually has the gall to grab her hand. “Hey, where’re you going so fast? I thought-”

Karma yanks her hand out of his grasp with ease, given her strength parameters, and he stumbles forward in surprise, right before she elbows him in the gut, sending him reeling back again. While he’s doubled over, she grabs the tray, smiles gratefully at Asuna, and they stride off.

“That was hot,” Uzala says to them.

Instantly, both girls charge up a martial arts skill, and he dives under the table with a yelp at a pitch Karma didn’t think any man is supposed to be able to reach. “And I mean that in a totally respectful, friendly way with the intention of conveying my limitless awe for your strength, please don’t hurt me!” he whimpers, despite the fact that they’re all in a safe zone at the moment.

Karma exchanges an exasperated look with Asuna and sets the tray of drinks down, rolling her eyes so hard she thinks they might roll out of her head. “That’s the kind of thing you say _after_ you’re drunk.”

“Have you _met_ him? There’s literally no distinction,” Muldar says sarcastically, and Uzala peeks out from under the table with a pout.

“I resent that. So Karma-”

“I’m not drinking with you guys.”

“Asuna-”

“Forget it.”

_“Danchou-”_

“No.”

Uzala makes a face. “Y’all are no fun.” He pops out of hiding and slings an arm around an innocent Kili. “Right, Kili?”

“...Eh?”

Karma leans over to Heathcliff and Asuna. “How about we vacate the table?”

A minute later, they’ve found a nice table by the fire to sit at, and Karma leans back with her coffee and a sigh of contentment, crossing her legs. “It’s deja vu all over again.”

Asuna blinks at her. “What?”

“Oh, I forgot. You weren’t there at the time. It was just the six of us—Kili wasn’t there either.” She grins at Heathcliff. “They grow up so fast, don’t they?”

Asuna frowns. “The two of us are practically the same age. And Kili’s older than you.”

“Details, details...So we went out to a tavern in a new town, and we were playing cards, and I wrecked them all in poker. I still can. _Ne,_ Heathcliff?” she adds with a teasing grin.

“We don’t talk about that,” he says, resolutely staring straight ahead.

Naturally, the next thing Asuna says is, “Why, what happened?”

“Long story short, we made a bet, played poker, and he lost,” Karma snickers. Her leader still won’t look at either of them. “But anyways, after the guys all got their egos beat by me, they started playing ring of fire, and the good leader and I found ourselves sitting out by the fireplace.” She raises her cup pointedly and takes a sip of coffee. “Just like we are now.”

“Wait, I wanna know what this bet was,” Asuna presses, starting to smirk.

“I said, we don’t talk about that,” Heathcliff repeats, a little louder.

Karma feigns a theatrically disappointed shrug. “Like he said, we don’t talk about that,” she sighs, but when Heathcliff’s back is turned, she winks at Asuna. “Not now, at least.”

She giggles, and Heathcliff glances over suspiciously at them, but Karma makes a purely innocent ‘who, me?’ expression. He narrows his eyes at her, but doesn’t comment.

Just then, NPC minstrels strike up a lively tune, and Karma perks up. “Hey, _danchou,_ wanna dance?”

“I’ll pass.”

“You’re boring. Let me show you how you’re supposed to reply. Hey, Asuna, wanna dance?”

“Sure!”

Karma gives Heathcliff a ‘see?’ look, but he just rolls his eyes and sips his coffee. She huffs in mild exasperation before linking arms with Asuna, grinning, and the two girls sashay to the dance floor.

\---

Some time later, they’ve dropped everyone off at their respective homes—while every guild member has a simple, utilitarian room at the castle, only Karma and Heathcliff really ‘live’ at KoB HQ. Everyone else has their own place.

After they dump Uzala off at his small apartment, Asuna heaves a long sigh and wipes her brow. “Finally.”

“It was a lot simpler when the place we were all staying at was also the place they went drinking at,” Karma remarks lightly, similarly exhausted, as they make their way back towards the town’s teleport gate. “We only had to drag them up one flight of stairs then, not through entire floors...You can get home by yourself, right, Asuna?”

“Yeah, no problem.” She hops on the teleport gate with a smile. “Thanks for inviting me tonight, I had a blast.”

In a sphere of bluish white light, she disappears to Floor 63, Selmburg. Karma climbs the stairs and waits for Heathcliff to join her before they both command, “Teleport, Granzam!”

The castle is quiet as they slip inside. It usually is—by now, everyone has gone home or to sleep in their room.

“Thank you, for inviting me,” says Heathcliff as they’re about to part ways. “It was…”

She lets out a low laugh. “Don’t hurt yourself. And you’re welcome.” With a huge yawn, she stretches her arms above her head. “I’m beat. _Oyasumi.”_

_“Oyasumi.”_

As she curls up in bed that night, a smile tugs at her lips when she recalls those precious few minutes she managed to convince him to join her on the dance floor.

Perhaps it’s the joy and fun and inanity of the night, or the exhaustion that resulted from it, or a combination of both, but she has no trouble falling asleep that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (The cyan-haired guy was Diavel, by the way)
> 
> It was mentioned that the 67th boss fight was really bad for some reason, and if that was explained in canon...oops. The player corpse idea doesn't belong to me, though; SeerKing (who is writing a great SAO OC fanfic called 'Swordsaint' on fanfiction dot net) gets full credit. You should check them out! It focuses on a third wielder of a unique skill. They get into the more technical side of the game, and some side characters show up there too. Also, on a somewhat related note, I was thinking of the Rotting Fodder mob from this game called Wizard101 for the boss.
> 
> Not gonna lie, when I was writing 'A Day Off', I legit searched up 'stupid things to argue about'.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops, look, the chapters are getting longer again...
> 
> Whew. This is the longest one I've written, I think. Okay, so this is actually the very first chapter that I ever wrote (so if it's a little choppy, that's probably why). This is where the premise of it really took off. So yeah, I've had this written since the beginning, just had to do some editing...which is not what I've been doing for the past week XD I just have this pet project I've been working on, and I kinda forgot about this whoops.

**_Crusade: 7/29/2024_ **

Karma’s gaze sweeps the cafe unobtrusively as soon as she steps inside—no head movements, just a flicker of her eyes, and her target is acquired.

A mousy brunette’s hostile gaze meets hers as she sits down, and her disgust for Laughing Coffin deepens, as it does every time she thinks it can’t, when she sees how young he is. At least it’ll make her job easier.

“Hello,” she greets politely. “I heard you’ve got a rather interesting night job. Mind telling me about it?”

His gaze darts to where her HP bar is, and where the KoB cross is. “I don’t know what you’re playing at, but I got nothing to say to you.”

“Oh, there’s plenty you could tell me. I’ll say this, though.” She leans in, as if sharing a confidential secret. “We can help you and your sister.”

The youth’s back stiffens immediately, and Karma breathes an inward sigh of relief that their intel was right. “How-”

“All we need is the location of your headquarters,” she says quickly before he can try to make a break for it. “I’ll see to it myself that she’s safe.”

“How do I know you will?” he hisses suspiciously, fists clenched on the tabletop.

She remembers Kota, and takes a steadying breath, clenching her red-clad fists under the table. “I have no wish to see a child killed.”

He scoffs. “Not even if she’s related to Laughing Coffin? You clearers won’t hesitate to take out anyone with the brand of our guild, innocent child or not.”

“I’m the highest-levelled player in the game, right hand of the strongest,” she responds coolly. “Haven’t you heard the rumors? If I give an order, it will be followed.”

When she sees the indecision in his gaze, she knows she’s won.

\---

Karma pushes open the heavy oak door. “I got it.”

Sitting at his desk behind a heap of paperwork that she certainly does not covet, Heathcliff nods, looking totally unsurprised, as usual. “And?”

She pulls up a holographic map, where a cave system on a lower floor has been marked, and sends the information to her boss—along with the picture that boy gave her. At Heathcliff’s raised eyebrow, she explains, “That’s his sister. I promised that I’d make sure she was safe. If she’s caught up in the melee, I don’t want any of our forces killing her in the heat of it.”

“She looks young. I doubt she’ll be in the battle, nor will our comrades kill a small girl. But I’ll send out the picture and a warning to keep an eye out.”

“Thank you. Is that all?”

He examines her carefully, and she blinks at his scrutiny. Finally, he asks, “Are you sure you’re holding up?”

She stares. “What?”

“This won’t be easy for you,” he says—not with pity, or even really sympathy. She shifts uneasily.

“You send me on solo missions to neutralize orange guilds all the time,” she mutters. “I’ve dealt with Laughing Coffin before.” She rubs her right hand unconsciously.

“This will be different.”

“I know that.” She takes a deep breath, running her gloved hand up her arm to her shoulder and squeezing, restless. “I’m worried,” she admits quietly. “A lot of the players we’re bringing have probably never had to face another player trying to kill them. Most of them have probably never tried to kill anyone. They’re going to be reluctant. They’ll think, ‘Oh, maybe they’ll be reasonable. They wouldn’t do something _this_ horrible…’ Their hesitation will get them killed. That’s what I’m worried about.” It could be someone she loves, because god knows she’s friends with so many good, kind-hearted, just and moral people, and that’s what she fears the most.

He steeples his fingers in front of him, pensive. “I agree. But we don’t have many other choices.”

“I know…” She’d do this herself if she could. But the heaviest she’s ever dared to stack the odds against herself is when she challenged around thirty Laughing Coffin players at once. That was a while ago, when many of those thirty were still relatively inexperienced. Even then, the best she could do was hold them off, depleting nearly all of her HP in the process, until Heathcliff and Asuna arrived.

She offers a crooked, wan smile she doesn’t feel, and asks, “Are _you_ doing alright? There’s been a lot going on recently.”

She’s mostly been busy out in the field while Heathcliff, Asuna, Godfree, and Uzala hammer out the details with the other guild leaders, which is pretty typical. But this isn’t going to be a boss battle against a pre-programmed NPC monster; this is to be a pitched, bloody fight, likely to the death in some cases, against other players—the most difficult foes in the game. Yes, Kayaba, a human, designed the programmed monsters. At the end of the day, though, they are still just 0’s and 1’s, but their upcoming quarries can think and plan for themselves. There’s bound to be conflict on how to handle it.

“We’re making steady progress. The Divine Dragon Alliance is being stubborn, but it’s getting there. Thank you for asking.”

Inwardly, she frowns at his report-like response. “That isn’t what I asked, Heathcliff.” Even in private, Asuna and all of the old guard call him by his guild title—leader. And Karma does too, but she often finds herself falling back into habits from when she first joined the group that wasn’t even a guild, and there were no spoken ranks.

Something akin to amusement flickers through his features. He stands and makes his way to the door; with a sigh, she falls into step behind him as they walk down the halls.

“Let’s meet with the other guild leaders to go over the information,” he says briskly, nodding to a few of their guild members as they pass by.

She’s already pulling up her friends menu to message Godfree, Uzala, and Asuna, gloved fingers flying. They'll get in touch with the others. "I’ll message them. Main conference room?” She probably won’t actually end up going. She's frankly had enough of the DDA's veiled jabs and insults by this point, and Heathcliff eventually just let her play hooky. She has better things to do anyway.

At his nod, she finishes the message and sends it out. “Any new recruitment?”

“Not for now. We’re looking for more solo players, like Kirito-kun. Asuna-kun already got in touch with him.”

She nods, unsurprised, waving away the confirmation messages.

Just then, she gets a message from Godfree, inviting her to some training later with some of the other fighters that’ll be in the raid. She hesitates to agree—duelling practice is something she’s stayed away from for a while.

All the more reason, then. And they need all the practice they can get. Before she can back out, she types out an affirmative reply and is about to send it when a thought occurs to her.

“Do you have any plans later?”

He thinks about that for a second. “...Nothing pressing.”

“Oh, okay, good.” She adds another segment to her message and hits send. “Because I just told Godfree you’d be coming to the training session with some of the other players tonight.”

His eyebrows shoot up, and he does sort of a double take—probably the most surprised he’s ever looked (except maybe that one time she went sledding on his shield). “Excuse me?”

“It’ll be a good morale boost for those outside our guild to see you participating, since you’ll be spearheading the raid,” she says, fighting back a grin.

“Karma-”

 _“Danchou_ , you’ve never lied to me before,” she says, affecting a solemn tone. “Don’t tell me you’d rather be stuck in your office doing paperwork all night, because then you’ll be up until two in the morning before I remember you’re still awake, and then I’ll get mad and take away the coffee again.”

He opens his mouth to reply, but she just smiles and says, “Okay, that’s settled! Hmm, Asuna hasn’t replied. I think I’ll go see what she’s up to. See you later, _danchou!”_

She gives an informal two-fingered salute and trots off before he can call her back.

\---

Asuna is in stitches. “I can’t believe that—that you actually-”

“It wasn’t hard, I just asked if he was doing anything, he said no, and I said cool, I signed you up, see you there,” Karma explains, chuckling at Asuna’s face, red from laughing so hard.

Kirito crosses his arms, looking mildly interested. “Your commander doesn’t seem the type to just hang out with his troops.”

“He’s not,” Karma agrees, “and neither am I, to be honest, which is why I did it. I haven’t gone to a duel training session in a while, for certain reasons…” With a slight grimace, she admits, “I haven’t really trained at all with the other guild members for a while, or even gone level-grinding with them, now that I think about it...You coming too, Kirito-kun?”

“No, thanks.”

She nods, unsurprised. “Okay. Asuna, you ready to go?”

The younger girl pats her rapier at her hip. “Yep, ready.”

\---

Karma grins when she watches Asuna dance around a hapless DDA player. “She’s gotten so good.” She glances over the others, eyes flickering between the distinctive white and crimson outfits. “They all have.”

From his seat next to her, Heathcliff nods, surveying all the players with a critical eye. “I’m not sure if it’ll be enough to stand up to player enemies, though.”

Her smile fades, and she sighs. “Yeah, it’s...not the same as fighting monsters.”

He glances sideways at her. “Perhaps you could give them all a few pointers.”

She grimaces. “I’m not—that’s...It’s hard to say when you don’t know what you’re up against. And what I do, it’s not something I…”

“I know it’s not something you’re proud of,” he agrees, easily completing her thoughts, something she finds gratifying sometimes and annoying at other times. “But you’re good at it, and your experience might save a few lives in the fight to come. It has in the past, if you’ve forgotten the boss on Floor 67.”

She hasn’t forgotten. No one has. Reluctantly, she nods, and forces her red-clad fists to unclench, even though she doesn’t remember clenching them. “Yeah, okay.”

_CLANG!_

Schmitt raises his hands in surrender, lance rolling to a stop a few feet away, and Asuna smiles triumphantly in satisfaction. She helps him up, offers a few words of advice, and Karma glances at her commander.

“Ready to switch in?” she asks, absently loosening her sword in its scabbard.

He gives an ‘I’d rather not’ sigh, but nods. “Very well.”

They circle around the edge of the practice field and are met halfway by Asuna, who high-fives Karma and stage-whispers, “Take him down.”

Karma grins, Heathcliff just looks mildly irritated.

She sends him a challenge, he accepts and sets it to half-HP mode, and they draw their weapons.

“We haven’t done this in a while,” she remarks a bit wistfully. “I missed it.”

With that, she lunges in.

Karma is left-handed with her sword, and his shield is on his left side, which should in theory give her an edge. Yet he has no problem blocking with his sword either, and instead turns his shield into an offensive weapon itself with his unique skill. An explosive, wheezing grunt bursts out of her as he shield-bashes her hard, slamming the rounded end into her stomach, and she goes tumbling in the sand, winded. Hastily, she scrambles to her feet before he can press his advantage. Despite his bulk, he moves dangerously fast—she’s still faster, being of a lighter build, but even so.

There’s a resounding clash of metal his sword skates off the side of her blade, and she slices up with a defiant yell. His steely expression flickers when she scores a shallow hit on his arm, but he forces her back with a few slashes of his blade and charges in, shield-first.

Her body moving almost of its own accord, she jumps. Her feet barely clear his sword blade and land on the rim of his shield, and she lets out a shriek of delight as she pushes off, blade flashing and braids twirling, leaving a deep line of red on his shoulder. She thinks she sees a hint of dry amusement flicker in his expression.

Unluckily for her, though, when she’s in midair, it’s not easy to dodge. His blade splits the air as he pivots, and she braces one hand against the flat of her blade with a wince even as the screech of metal on metal reaches her ears. Her HP gauge is ticking down, point by point, as she lands hard in the sand, but she stabilizes herself and reverses her momentum in an instant.

In the end, Heathcliff still wins. He’s lost to her once when she caught him off guard, and hasn’t lost a duel since then, to her knowledge. Although she put up a good fight with her martial arts skills, once she lost her sword, it was game over against such a skilled opponent. With good cheer, she accepts his hand up and her sword back, and smiles when he hands her a minor health potion, even though she has her own.

“That was fun,” she states.

He nods, sheathing his sword. “I agree.”

Her smile widens as she pops the top off of the potion. “So we’ll do it again sometime, right?”

His answer is as cryptic and enigmatic as always. “We’ll see.”

She grins, and downs the potion in one gulp. “That better be a yes.” With a flip of her braids, she turns to go find another opponent.

Ever since her first orange guild mission, in which she was forced to kill a player who wouldn’t surrender, and the subsequent training session, in which she’d almost stabbed her commander in the chest because she lost her head for a second, she’d mostly stayed out of the duel ring.

Wistfully, as she knocks Sanza’s spear out of his hand with a kick, she admits that she’s forgotten how much fun it is.

\---

_ 8/5/2024 _

The pressure is stifling. It’s an old friend for Karma by now, but this time, it’s not just her own life she’s risking. In the battle to come, she could lose friends and family. That part is no different from a boss fight, but red players are infinitely more dangerous. She knows exactly what they’re all getting into, and somehow, it’s no less nerve-wracking than walking into a boss fight with vague, limited information.

Karma glances at Asuna, who’s walking beside her. The younger girl wears a set expression, but her eyes show anxiety and fear.

_“Are you nervous?”_

_Asuna looked up at Karma’s quiet question, then returns to prepping her equipment. “I don’t want to kill anyone,” she whispered. In the moment, she looked for all intents and purposes much like the seventeen-year-old she was._

_Karma felt a surge of sorrow and righteous anger, and she grasped Asuna’s hands. “If I have my way, you won’t have to,” she promised impulsively._

Her gloved grip on her sword tightens. She remembers—twenty-one players so far have fallen to her blade. Fourteen Laughing Coffin members, six other orange guild members, and one more. She remembers their faces—twenty crazed, sometimes desperate, one horrified and furious. Some fought to kill because that was their life then. Some fought because they thought it was the only way out. _That_ one just didn’t expect to die so fast.

Before they enter the dungeon where Laughing Coffin has holed away, Heathcliff glances at Karma expectantly. With a reluctant sigh, she turns to face the crusaders, leaping up onto a small boulder to be seen and heard.

“Everyone,” she says loudly, calling upon her days as a commander of team B in order to project her voice to everyone. “If you don’t know me, my name is Karma. I’m from the Knights of the Blood Oath, and I unfortunately have a lot of experience with player killers. Before we go in, I need to make a few things clear.

“Offer surrender—once, and once only. If they don’t hesitate to keep attacking, you cannot hesitate to kill them. That split second is all they need to kill you, or the one standing next to you.” She’s well aware that many of these players, some from her own guild, will offer surrender multiple times, reluctant to kill, but it’s worth putting it out there in case some of them listen.

“Players are smarter than NPC monsters. You can read them, but they can change. They can plan and think on the spot. The biggest difference is that when their lives are in danger, they get desperate, and desperation leads to reckless, unexpected tactics that an NPC would never resort to. You can’t let down your guard. You have to be ready for anything, even the most underhanded tricks. They won’t be above dragging the fight through the mud, and you’ll have to do the same if you want to survive.”

She hesitates. Her blunt nature was part of why Asuna, who’s much better with people, took over. But she feels the need to add, “People are going to die today, on both sides. I think we all know that. So please, watch each other’s backs. No matter which guild you belong to, whether you love or hate the person next to you, you have to trust them today. And you have to let them trust you too. That’s the only way we’ll win.”

Who is she kidding? No one’s going to win today.

With that, she scrambles down from her perch. “Was that okay?” she asks quietly as she rejoins Heathcliff.

“It was necessary.”

Without another word, he leads the way into the dungeon. Asuna squeezes Karma’s hand with a wan smile. “Well said.”

Karma tries to smile back, but she’s not sure it looks much like a smile.

\---

_“Ambush!”_

Karma grits her teeth as she blocks a downward cleaving axe. With a grunt, she forces the blade to the side and stabs at the black cloak. He dances away, teeth shining in glee, and another crusader charges him with a frenzied cry.

This wasn’t supposed to happen. They were _sure_ that boy wouldn’t dare tell the guild, for fear of his own life and potentially his sister’s, given the information he leaked. Evidently, they were wrong. Or maybe there was a leak somewhere else down the line. Right now, as players die around her, it’s not relevant.

A tortured scream cuts off as soon as it starts, and fury bursts inside her as she lunges. She catches the Laughing Coffin member off guard and buries the point of her sword into his back, shoving it all the way through with both hands and bared teeth. A shower of pixels is her reward.

For ever crusader life that’s ended because of her error, she’ll take three Laughing Coffin lives so they can’t steal more.

Once she starts, she practically goes on autopilot. Her field of vision turns into explosions of blue, green, and blinding white, and it’s just about all she can see anymore. Occasionally, she spots crimson or white on her KoB comrades, blue and steel gray from the DDA, and other colors of random guilds. And far too much black and muddy brown from Laughing Coffin, far more than she’d been told.

It’s almost easy for her. Even Laughing Coffin isn’t exempt from the demographics. Ninety percent are right-handed, and most don’t even carry a shield. One, two, three slashes, an occasional sword skill, and then it’s easy to slam her blade up their jaw, or slash a gaping smile of red pixels across their throats, or drive her sword into where their hearts should be.

For a few seconds, the red of her gloves looks like her hands are soaked with-

When she’s cleared a sizeable area around her, she looks around wildly, panting. She spots a flash of auburn hair, and zeroes in on it, destroying any black and brown in her way until she fights her way to Asuna. The rapier-wielder unleashes a flurry of green light, expression stricken and pupils dilated in horror, and it makes Karma sick to the stomach.

With a scream, her blade cuts so deep into the Laughing Coffin member’s side that she nearly bisects him, and he bursts into pixels. She spares a glance at Asuna’s HP bar, relieved for all of a second when she sees it’s in the low green still, and then she whirls around in a blur of crimson and dives back into the pixels and steel.

“Put down your weapons and surrender!” Godfree orders, weapon held aloft, like the other three KoB by his side. “Come peacefully and-”

One of the two red players they’ve cornered leaps forward with a screech, and Karma’s wordless cry reaches the Knights too late. The first Laughing Coffin member dies instantly when impaled on a longsword, but the other strikes down two KoB before Karma hacks his head from his shoulders with an enraged roar.

No more, she vows, whirling around and leaping back into the fray with a soft whimper, tears stinging her eyes. No more. She can’t take it.

She’ll kill every single one if she has to—if only to escape this pain.

\---

"It's her!"

She whirls around at the shout, and she leaps back as a red player smashes their axe into the ground where she stood. Several converge on her at once, obviously recognizing her either by her face or her actions so far, and she's forced to fall back.

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees a flash of white and red and auburn, trying to get to her amidst the sea of muddy brown and black, and panic grips her by the throat, throttling her.

"Stay away!" she screams hoarsely, backing up to the edge of the platform. Her heel teeters over the edge.

The red players say something; she's not listening. The words weren't meant for them anyway. But Asuna doesn't listen, and Karma grits her teeth, tearing her eyes away from her pristine white outfit. Without warning, she lunges at the red players, fighting like a demon straight out of hell, and they fall like puppets with their strings cut.

Cornered animals always bite back, and nothing is more dangerous than someone with something to protect.

\---

The bloodbath is just starting to ebb. While guarding two guildmates as they tie up red players, Heathcliff is distracted by the cry of a familiar voice.

Karma sinks to one knee with a gasp of relief when one of the three Laughing Coffin members attacking her is sent flying off the platform into the abyss. Her commander stands in front of her, his tower shield bearing the brunt of the remaining attacks.

“Heal yourself!” he barks at her over his shoulder before engaging their attackers.

Her gaze flickers involuntarily to her HP bar, and her artificial heart skips a beat when she sees a barest sliver of red. Her fingers tremble as she pulls out a crystal from her inventory and utters the command, the stark reality of her mortality hitting her all at once.

At her shout, Heathcliff sinks to one knee behind his tower shield, and she uses him as a stepping stone to vault over him and the red players. Pivoting on her heel, she buries her sword into the back of one of them. He shield-bashes the other hard, and she finishes him off with a reverse stab.

Finally, the battlefield falls quiet. Karma numbly hugs Asuna when she spots the younger girl, and nods at Kirito, who’s nearby. He just stares, dark eyes blank. She’s no leader anymore, hasn’t been for a while, but she makes her rounds amongst her guild anyway. She tries to ignore the stares she gets—both from other guilds, and her own, which hurt far more—and just passes out her healing items in near silence, since she only used one.

Eleven fatalities on the crusaders’ side. Three Knights of the Blood Oath. All names that she knew only in passing. They must’ve been new. Or maybe she just hasn’t been a true member of the guild for so long that she never noticed. They’re just blank faces now, ones she might’ve seen once or twice in the halls of Granzam Castle. There aren’t even any bodies that she can identify.

She finds herself standing before the commander after some time.

“...Should we start heading out?” she finally asks. Her voice sounds too loud to her own ears, despite the constant cacophony of metal screeching and voices screaming mere minutes ago; in reality, she’s speaking almost too softly for him to hear.

He nods distantly. She almost doesn’t want to ask.

“How many...did we...kill?”

Heathcliff slowly turns to look her in the eye. She’s not sure what she sees there.

“Thirty-two.”

\---

_ 8/6/2024 _

“What were you thinking?”

Karma flinches—not at the volume of his voice, which is low, but at the cold intensity in it. “I-”

“You could’ve died out there.” Heathcliff is angrier than she’s ever seen him, but it’s a cold kind of anger, and the weight of it makes her shoulders hunch more and more with each word because it’s aimed straight at her. “You were so reckless, Karma. Did you even look at your HP bar a single time?”

She didn’t. There’s nothing she can say, so she doesn’t say anything, just stares at the tiled floor, instinctively making herself as small as she can. Standing before him, furious as he is, makes her feel like she’s suffocating. He’s never been so upset with her. She’s never seen him so upset, period.

Finally, Heathcliff sighs wearily. “Thirty-two, Karma...Your orders, like everyone else’s, were to subdue as many as possible. Not kill.”

Her jaw clenches as she thinks of all the lives lost—eleven too many. “Did you see how many were killed because we gave them a chance?” she whispers, gripping the edge of her cloak with red-clad fingers. “You saw it happening, Heathcliff. We all did. We’d have them backed into a corner. Their HP bars would be in the red. We'd offer them multiple chances to surrender, and they would catch us by surprise and strike us down. No matter the chance, I wasn’t going to let that be Asuna, or Godfree, or Uzala, or you!”

Her voice rose steadily through her tirade, and with a near hysterical touch to her voice, she whispers, arms wrapped tightly around herself, “I can’t lose any of you.”

After a moment of silence, she dares to meet his stormy gray gaze. There’s still anger in there, but also a sort of suspicious curiosity. Slowly, he circles around his desk, hand trailing along the back of his chair, and comes to stand in front of her.

“Tell me,” he says simply.

A long, shaky breath escapes her. So does the truth.

“When we met,” she whispers, closing her eyes, “you saved me from that dire wolf.” Her voice breaks slightly, her throat tight. “But it was too late for my boyfriend.” She shakes her head slowly. “After those players cut him down to red, the dire wolf tore the rest of him to shreds before I could even charge up a sword skill. They killed him for being a beta tester, and he was defenseless because he never had to fight another player for his life before.”

She feels a need to justify herself. He’s mad, she knows that, and she understands his reasons. But she wants him to know hers too.

“I didn’t kill them because I thought they deserved to die. And although they deserved to atone for their sins, I don’t wish death on anyone stuck here in this game. But I _will_ kill if the alternative puts people I care about at risk,” she tells him quietly.

Her fists tighten on the material of her cloak, and she squeezes her eyes shut, head bowed. Crystalline tears bead on the floor tiles. “I was just so scared,” she breathes. “I don’t want to lose anyone else I care about.”

Suddenly, a hand rests softly on top of her head, and she feels herself being drawn into a surprisingly gentle embrace. A sob bursts out of her, and she wraps her arms around her commander, burying her face in his shoulder.

“I can’t say that I understand perfectly,” he says quietly. “Just that you should have a little more faith in the people you care about. None of us die particularly easily.”

“I know,” she whispers, hiccupping pathetically. “I know, I’m sorry…” And of course she does know that—most of the time, at least. Her boyfriend was inexperienced and naive, and he died because of it. Her loved ones now are anything but. Her mind knows the present situation, her heart is fixated on the past.

She feels him let out a sigh. “You were seconds away from pointlessly throwing away your life out there. Don’t ever do that again.”

Overwhelmed and broken down, all she can muster is a small nod.

Later, she's going to leave this office, and walk down the halls, and pretend she doesn't hear them whisper. Later, she's going to sit at Heathcliff's right hand at boss meetings and refuse to rise to the DDA's bait when they question her sanity, yet again. Later, she's going to leave Granzam and not see it or its occupants for weeks on end. Later, she's going to up her body count, the one she meticulously, painstakingly kept track of throughout these months, only to lose track of how much blood is on her hands because of her foolish mistake.

Later, she'll fix that perfect mask that she's gotten used to wearing.

Later, she'll smile at Asuna and say, "Sure, yeah, everything's fine. Oh, Heathcliff just wanted to talk about the upcoming boss fight. I might not make it."

Later, when she and Heathcliff and the upper KoB members attend a debrief meeting on the Laughing Coffin raid, she'll stay at his right hand, and the shoulder of his robes will be pristine and remarkably dry, as if she never cried an ocean of tears onto it.

Later, they'll all pretend like everything is normal.

For now, though, he lets her cling to him like a drowning person, he holds her without a word of complaint, and he lets her cry until she can't anymore.

\---

A knock on the door startles Karma out of her head, and she clears her throat. “Um, come in.”

It’s Asuna. She offers a small, genuine smile (how does she do it?) as she walks in. “D’you have a few minutes to spare?”

A quick teleport later and they’re standing in the Town of Beginnings, and Asuna takes her hand. “Come on, I want to show you something.”

It doesn’t take a genius to deduce where they’re going. “A-Asuna…”

“I know you’ve been busy for the past few days, but I want you to see this.”

Karma sighs quietly. It’s not like she’s been busy doing actual work. As part of her ‘punishment’ for disobeying orders, she’s basically grounded for a few days, no field work. Heathcliff’s been keeping her busy with more administrative stuff and essentially giving her a break. She should be hunting down escaped Laughing Coffin members, but he told her that she needed to take some time off and rest. She hadn’t argued, and she’s sure she wouldn’t be able to focus clearly in the field with everything that happened, but all she’s been doing with her free time is getting stuck in her own head. She of all people should know how dangerous it is to linger on things that can't be changed, but that's just human nature, she supposes.

A quick squeeze of her hand brings her back to reality. “We’re here,” Asuna says with a small smile. Her hand is warm, even through the fabric of Karma’s gloves.

Their status as top KoB members gets them past the ALS guards, and one of them escorts them down to the prisons. Before they enter the dungeons proper, Asuna whispers a few words of reassurance to Karma.

Still, she nearly balks when a cacophony of yelling greets her appearance. The enraged accusations, the threats, the barbs and jabs, are nearly enough to make her turn and run.

“Murderer!”

“You’re no better than us!”

“You killed my brother!”

“If we get back to the real world, I swear I’ll-”

“Heartless-” “Cruel-” “Insane-” “Crazy-”

“You’re gonna join us down here one day, when they all realize you’re _just like us!”_

She can’t run; if she runs now, she’ll run again someday, and though her expression remains impassive, she can feel herself starting to tremble, because behind every crazed jeer and taunt is a grain of truth. Intentions can shape deeds, but they don’t change them once they’re done.

“I’ve got you,” Asuna whispers confidently, gripping her hand tight, and she desperately anchors herself to the brunette’s calm voice. “Come on. They’re further downstairs.”

Through numb lips, she manages to force out, “...They?”

Luckily, the lower level is less occupied. The prisoners’ hateful stares are near tangible, but as the hollering from the upper level fades, Karma feels the pressure begin to relax a bit too.

They round the corner, and Asuna says, “I trust you recognize them?”

Her lips part in surprise. “Oh…”

Her informant looks up at her. But there’s no animosity there, no hatred or lust for vengeance. Just recognition. And he’s not alone.

Sitting on the cold stone floor outside the cell is a twiggy, brown-haired little girl who stares up at Karma with big blue eyes. “Are you Karma-san?” she asks quietly.

She sinks to one knee next to the girl, still half-shocked. “You must be Nagi.”

Asuna turns to the ALS guard. “Please give us some space.” The guard scowls behind his helmet, but at her expression, he reluctantly retreats to the staircase, out of earshot.

“I’ve been trying to get in contact with you,” her informant explains quietly. “The guards-” He shoots the ALS guard a nasty look. “-wouldn’t listen. But I saw Asuna-san here, and I knew you were a member of the Knights of the Blood Oath. It was a long shot, but I tried asking if I could talk to you. To my surprise, she agreed.”

Karma opens and closes her mouth several times in an attempt to form some sort of reply. “...Did you leak our plans to attack to Laughing Coffin?” she finally asks quietly.

His eyes widen. “No! God, no, they—they’d kill Nagisa—I would never-”

The quaver in his voice is pure fear, and she closes her eyes briefly. “...Why did you want to see me?”

He quickly regains his composure. “To thank you,” he says simply, shifting his position on the cold floor. “I’ve committed a lot of crimes in this game, but my sister had no part in it. You could’ve just ignored me once I gave you the information, but you made sure she wouldn’t be harmed. Thanks to you, she’s safe. She lives in the Town of Beginnings now, in a sort of round-the-clock daycare shelter for younger kids.”

Nagi nods along in agreement, smiling. “Thank you,” she echoes sweetly, taking Karma’s limp, gloved hand.

Speechless, Karma looks up at Asuna, who drops to the floor next to them with a small smile. “I know you’ve had a tough time these past few days. I thought it might be nice for you to see the good that you did.”

If she sat there with her fists balled up in her cloak as tears trickled down her face, wracked with silent sobs, then that’s nobody’s business but hers.

\---

Later that night, she’s called to the commander’s office.

“I was intending to keep you here for another few days, but the escaped red players are already starting to make a mess out there,” he says with a reluctant sigh, manipulating his menu as she sits down in front of him, eying his steaming coffee mug with extreme jealousy.

She shrugs, unsurprised, and just asks for the information. His cool gaze flickers up, as if to assess her; she tilts her head marginally, daring him to say something.

When he’s done explaining, he says, “You’re going to be quite busy.”

She allows herself a humorless smile. “So are you. We’re approaching Floor 75.” That coffee smells really good right now, especially knowing she has a job ahead of her.

“Yes,” he sighs, long, thin fingers folded atop his mahogany desk. “It won’t be long now.”

She drums her fingers on his desk. She should probably be heading out right about now, into the chilly night air and the dark, but it’s warm and bright where she is, and the smell of coffee is waking her up ever so slightly.

“What do you think will happen once we get back to the real world?”

Heathcliff raises his eyebrows at her. “What do you mean?” The coffee is just sitting there and it pisses her off.

“I dunno. Just...what do you think will happen?”

Giving in, Karma grabs his coffee mug and takes a drink, and he stares at her. “Really?”

“Hey, I didn’t know you’d be sending me out, or I would’ve gotten my own,” she defends. “Anyways…” She takes another drink and slides it back over; he takes it and casually puts it out of her reach. “Everyone’s lives were basically put on hold for two years. I was a second year high school student. I was at that point where I was supposed to be thinking about my future and stuff.”

“Supposed to?”

“I wasn’t,” she laughs without any real humor. “I didn’t want to think about it. Actually, one of the reasons I gave in and let my boyfriend put a NerveGear on me was because while he was talking at me about it over the phone, my extended family visited, and they were bugging me about that stuff...so yeah…” She half-rises out of her seat to grab his coffee again, ignoring his half-hearted glare. “Great way to escape my responsibilities, y’know?”

He gives up on getting his coffee back. “Why didn’t you want to think about it? High school was horrible,” he says bluntly. “I couldn’t wait to leave.”

“Well, I liked it,” she protests, making a face at him. “But never mind that. After the game ends, a bunch of students are going to be missing years of education. That’ll set people back more than just however long it takes for us to get out of here. People who had opportunities lined up won’t have that.” She glances at him. “What were you doing before this whole thing anyways?”

His eyes gleam in the light of the lamp as he tilts his head with an enigmatic smile. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

Karma huffs into the coffee mug, now hers. “Fine, be that way,” she grumbles. “I’ll put my bets on...oh, I dunno. High school English literature teacher or something.”

Amusement flickers in a smirk. “Really.”

“Yeah, I mean, you’re obsessed with _Wuthering Heights-”_

“And that defines my profession in real life?”

“And you seem to put up with our bunch of idiots well enough-”

“You talk like you aren’t one of them.”

“Jerk. I just figured you’ve had some kind of practice in that department, and high schoolers are the _worst_.”

Heathcliff gives a slight shrug. “True.”

“And...hmm, let’s see. I bet you’re single.”

“Thanks.”

“Hey, that’s, like, the way to go.”

“Didn’t you have a boyfriend?”

She gives him a look. “Exactly.” He snorts softly in amusement. “I bet you’re that one cool teacher at school who’s a strict grader but still a super good teacher, and every time one of those kids tries to prank you, you find a way to throw it back in their faces and be a smug jerk about it. Oh, but at your tiny apartment, you have three or four cats-”

“Cats?”

“You’re definitely a cat person. I have a cat, trust me. They’re smug little bastards, and you can definitely be a smug little bastard sometimes-”

“Excuse me?”

“Because when you try to love them, they hiss at you, and when you go to do something else, they’re like ‘no, love me’. They’re very contradictory. You are contradictory sometimes. Did you know cats are liquid?”

His eyebrows have been slowly creeping skywards as she talks (the coffee is starting to kick in). “No, since I have zero cats in real life.”

“Damn. I don’t see you having dogs.”

“I have no pets.”

“No wonder why you’re so boring,” she teases, and then she pauses. “Wait, so are you single?”

He stares at her. “I forget why we’re talking about this.”

“Are you?” she presses, leaning in with a grin.

Heathcliff actually hesitates for a moment. “...I’m not sure,” he finally admits, looking quite confused himself. “Our relationship was...complicated, and no, I’m not telling a teenage girl about my love life, or lack thereof.”

Karma holds her hands up (well, the hand that isn’t holding his coffee mug) in reluctant surrender, smirking. “Fine, fine...This was fun, actually.” It’s a welcome change. “People speculate about what you do in real life, you know.”

He looks mildly amused by that. “Do they now?” His expression turns slightly wistful. “Well, even if the game is cleared, there’s no way I’ll go back to what I was doing then…” He shakes his head. “Anyways, it’s a bit premature to be thinking about that now, isn’t it? We haven’t actually gotten to Floor 75 yet, and with the escaped Laughing Coffin players on the loose, it doesn’t look like progress will speed up anytime soon.”

“Is this your way of kicking me out to work?”

“Sort of. It’s my way of kicking you out to work so I can have my coffee back.”

“Too bad.” She gets to his feet and sets the mug down with a Cheshire cat grin. “I drank all of it. And oh, would you look at the time, I gotta get going now-”

“Karma-”

“Don’t stay up too late,” she warns him, already at the door, “or I’ll kick your ass when I get back.”

“Karma.”

She glances back at the change in his tone. “Yeah?”

His expression is near unreadable. “Be careful.”

Karma stares at him. She can count on one hand how many times he’s said that to her. The only other time she remembers is when she went to walk into Laughing Coffin’s trap.

“I always am,” she answers, perplexed at first, but then she realizes, given what happened, he has a right to be skeptical. “I won’t let the past hinder my judgement like it did before,” she says firmly. “You have my word on that.”

She says it for her as much as she does for him. Saying it out loud as a promise seals her resolve. She would never break her word to him.

Heathcliff looks as if he wants to say something else. But he just nods and says, “Put on more coffee on your way out.”

He’s looking back down at his paperwork, so he doesn’t see her roll her eyes as she walks out the door.

“A teacher,” he murmurs to himself, fiddling with his pen. He could almost laugh.

Perhaps in another life. He’s already screwed things up way too badly in this one.

Still, he thinks to himself, looking up at where the door clicked shut behind her crimson cloak, he wouldn’t change it even if he was given the chance to redo it a thousand times over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the canon death count for LC was 21, but I upped it to 32. One thing I kinda wanted to get at here is that normally, Karma wouldn't behave like she did in the raid; she typically tries to take people alive even at risk to herself. But when the risk is placed on her friends and family too, that kind of flies out the window. It even overrides Heathcliff's orders to take the red players alive.
> 
> I'm pretty sure Heathcliff wasn't part of the Laughing Coffin raid in canon, but eh.
> 
> So I had all of that written a while ago, except the last part with their kinda stupid conversation XD I know it might not fit with the rest of the chapter's mood, but I just wanted to write more of them interacting in this chapter...and then that kinda wrote itself...
> 
> Also, Heathcliff/Kayaba x Rinko has so much potential for exploration! Like...complicated? I bet. Sigh. I love hearing about my real life friends' drama, so I'm a huge sucker for complicated relationships, real or fictional XD
> 
> Hmm looking back on the doc history, I also had 'Shhh', 'Sleep', 'Debriefing', and a few others written since the beginning.
> 
> And hey, like they pointed out, we're getting close to the end! I'll admit now that I don't have any plans for what's going to happen after Aincrad (well, actually, I have plans, I just don't have any plans to execute those plans), so we'll see.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter chapter this time.

**_Cold Hands: 8/26/2024_ **

With a defiant cry, Karma lunges at the monster, bisecting it from shoulder to hip, and it shatters in a shower of polygons as she lands in a crouch. “Oh, neat, I levelled up.” Everyone’s levels are so high these days that it takes a huge amount of exp to gain even a single level. She’s been creeping up on the edge for a while now.

“No fair, you always do too much damage by the time we catch up,” Asuna complains light-heartedly, sheathing her rapier. “When we get there, the monsters are half-dead.”

Karma laughs, cocking her hip playfully. “The Lightning Flash tells me I’m too fast? Better write down the date.”

As Heathcliff walks by her, he nudges her with his shield lightly. “Why don’t you let the others take point this time?”

“Aww, fine.”

Asuna grins and jogs on ahead, followed by Uzala and Godfree. The five of them had time to spare _at the same time_ , for once in their lives, so they decided to go out for a short hunt in the fields around Granzam—more for relaxation than levelling, but it’s been fun to just hang out with them, like they used to. Karma hasn’t had much time to kill since the Laughing Coffin raid. Unlike the other front liners, her job isn’t done after just one fight. Most of the red players were captured, but not all, and it’s her job now to track them down.

Karma takes a step forward, the traces of a grin still on her face, when her vision suddenly wavers. She stumbles into the canyon wall, her legs shaky, and her breathing quickens at the unexpected dizziness. A quick glance up at her HP bar says that there are no debuffs on her, but she feels as if she’s burning up. The beginnings of a migraine begin drumming at her temples, and she grimaces, swaying where she stands.

Through a glitchy blur, she sees Heathcliff turn around. _“D-danchou,”_ she mumbles through a haze of static audio, each syllable ricocheting painfully off the edges of her skull.

His frame stiffens in surprise at her condition. She sees his mouth move but can’t make out the words. Weakly, she tries to take a step towards him, but the small movement sends a bolt through her head, and she crumples to the side.

Asuna and the others whirl around at sound of armor clattering, expecting more foes, but all they see is Heathcliff crouched on the ground, and a pair of twin braids dangling limply. “What happened?” she demands, rushing over.

“I’m not sure,” he admits, propping an unconscious Karma up into a more comfortable position against his shoulder. “She just collapsed.”

All of them stare at her avatar for a few seconds. Her HP bar is still in the mid green, and there are no debuffs on her. She looks like she’s just sleeping. Players don’t usually faint in game. It’s happened to Karma before, most notably at the 67th boss fight, but that was a situation in which she was extremely mentally exhausted, which can happen in real life too. This time, it just happened out of nowhere.

“Remember in the first week of the game, when all the players were being moved to hospitals and stuff?” Uzala chimes in uncertainly. “The connection got destabilized for a bit before they came back online, or whatever. Maybe that’s it?”

Heathcliff frowns down at her. “Maybe, but I don’t see why…You’re right, though, it probably has something to do with her real body.”

“You should teleport back with her,” Godfree suggests, brow furrowed in concern. “We’ll follow on foot.”

He nods, already rifling through his inventory for two teleport crystals. At a quiet command, both their avatars disappear.

\---

Karma wakes up to a pounding headache and a stifling fever. She hasn’t felt either in so long, and she almost starts panicking. “Wh-what…”

A silver and red blur solidifies into her commander, sitting a chair next to her bed with a book in hand. She’s in her and Asuna’s room (well, mostly her room now), she realizes.

He looks up at her bleary mumble. “How do you feel?”

Wincing at the bright afternoon sun coming through the window, she lifts a hand weakly to rub at her forehead. “M-my head really hurts…and it’s really hot…”

He reaches over to place a hand on her forehead, and she gives a quiet sigh of relief at the cool touch of his skin. “Asuna-kun said she once had to take care of a friend who had similar symptoms as you do, but no debuffs of any sort. We asked around, and it seems like your real body might be coming down with a cold.”

She groans wordlessly at that, wriggling uncomfortably under her blankets. “H-how long…?”

“For most people, it passed within a day. At least you can’t pass it onto another player while in the game, if this is really something happening in real life.”

“Ugh…” When he goes to remove his hand, she scrunches up her face in a pout. “No, wait, your hand feels cool, it’s really nice…”

She hears Heathcliff sigh. “You’re quite needy when you’re sick,” he mutters under his breath, but he places the back of his hand on her cheek anyways, to her relief.

“Shut up,” she mumbles, unconsciously nuzzling a bit into his palm. “I’m sick. You should feel sorry for me.”

“Maybe if you weren’t so talkative…”

“Heard that...Whatcha reading?”

_“Wuthering Heights.”_

“Can you read out loud?”

Another sigh. “What are you, five? Besides, I have work to do.”

Karma opens her eyes a bit and gives him her best pitiful puppy dog look. “You’re leaving me in my hour of need?” she whimpers.

“You’re so dramatic. You’ll be fine. I’ll send Asuna-kun to keep you company.”

“I thought you said you didn’t have anything to do. That’s why you came out with us today.”

He falls silent, and she knows she’s got him. A weak smile twitches on her face, which he can feel under his hand, and he pokes her cheek warningly. “Stop being smart, or I’ll start wondering if you’re actually sick.”

“You’re mean,” she whines, sniffling for dramatic effect. Her nose isn’t actually stuffy or anything. “Read? Please?”

“You’re acting like Linton.”

She tries to squash an amused smirk. Probably the only people who would get that reference in this entire floating castle are sitting in this room.

“Now that’s just cruel. Please?” she wheedles plaintively, drawing out the plea.

The silence stretches on for a few seconds. “...Fine. But I’ll need both hands to hold the book.”

She gives her own melodramatic sigh. “Oh, alright…”

Karma wriggles around so she’s curled up on her side so that she can watch him instead of the ceiling. He crosses his legs and props open the book before clearing his throat, making her wince as her headache spikes, but his soft, calm voice soothes her again.

_“‘The twelve years, continued Mrs. Dean, following that dismal period, were the happiest of my life…’”_

\---

_** Bodyguards: 9/25/2024 ** _

“Are you serious?”

Heathcliff raises an eyebrow at her, cool as a cucumber, and Karma groans. “Of course you are. Why did I even ask.”

“It’s the third time it’s happened.”

She presses the gloved fingertips of one hand to her forehead with a sigh. “But bodyguards? Really? Doesn’t that seem a bit...excessive? The people you’re talking about are all smart enough not to leave a safe zone on a higher floor by themselves, and there’s no way to hurt a player inside a safe zone except by duel.” Asuna is going to be so pissed.

“Regardless, I can’t lose any of my leaders,” Heathcliff says firmly, and she sighs again. By this point, she knows him well enough to know that he’s not going to change his mind. “Including you.”

She blinks. “...Eh?” The words hit her a moment later. “Oh, hell no. No, no, no, no, no, you’re not giving me a bodyguard. If you do, I’m quitting.” Not that that means much, since she’s technically not even a guild member right now (they haven’t gotten around to it after her last mission), and even if she did ‘quit’, she’d still be doing the same things. “No. No, no, and no. Definitely, absolutely not. No.”

He gives her a look. “I think you’ve made your point, but-”

“No! No but’s! One, I’m more than capable of playing solo, it’s what I’ve been doing since last year! Two, I’m not even a sub-leader anymore. And three, I love these guys, but none of them know the meaning of subtlety. How am I supposed to be tracking down Laughing Coffin members with one of them hovering behind me all the time? That’s ridiculous. You might as well just give me back the cross on my HP bar.”

The deadpan look persists for another few seconds before he sighs. “I suppose you’re right about that.”

_“Thank_ y-”

“However, _you_ get to be the one to explain this to Asuna.”

“...I _don’t_ like you.”

After she leaves all huffy and cross, Heathcliff sits back and picks up his coffee. Little does she know that he never intended to assign her a bodyguard in the first place, for all the reasons she stated. He just wanted to see her reaction, and maybe get out of having to explain it to his most temperamental sub-leader.

He sips at his coffee with a smirk. Two birds with one stone.

\---

“WHAT?!”

Karma winces as her artificial eardrums are just about blown to smithereens. “Asuna-”

“Bodyguards?!” she demands, only marginally quieter than before, and Karma winces again. “That’s ridiculous! I don’t need one!”

“I-I know, Asuna!...Please calm down.” They’re sitting in the castle courtyard right now, and everyone within a twenty-meter radius jumped at her shout.

Karma watches nervously as Asuna fumes, pacing back and forth like a caged tiger. And caged tigers are not nice tigers.

Finally, Asuna demands, “Well? Who’s yours?”

Oh, this is the part she’s been dreading. “Well...I...managed to convince Heathcliff that I didn’t need—shouldn’t have one,” she hastily corrects herself. “B-because, well, y’know, I’m busy with Laughing Coffin, and-”

_“WHAT?!”_

Karma falls off the bench with a squeak, and she scrambles to hide behind it, peeking out nervously as Asuna goes off on a long-winded rant, increasing the intensity of her pacing. If she wasn’t so petrified at the moment, Karma would be impressed by how Asuna came up with that entire tirade on the fly just now.

She glares up at the tallest window on the north side and narrows her eyes when she sees a flash of crimson, and an amused gray gaze for a split second.

“Oh, sure, laugh it up,” she mutters to herself. “I just can’t win with this whole bodyguard thing, can I…” She made sure not to let Asuna hear that, though.

\---

_** Shadow and Light: 10/22/2024 ** _

“It's not all bad, really,” Karma tries to reassure Kirito. “I'm still part of the guild, but the commander lets me have a rather large margin of independence. I work by myself most of the time, but I have the backup and authority of the guild if I need it, and it’s useful.”

Both of them know that it’s only because of the mutual trust and faith in each other built up over the two years of the game that Heathcliff does allow Karma her independence. If anything, Heathcliff will be keeping an even closer eye on Kirito than he would any other rank and file guild member. Kirito doesn't bring that up, though, recognizing her attempt to make him feel better.

In a half-hearted attempt at humor, he gestures at her and asks Asuna, “See, why couldn’t I have an outfit like that?”

Said outfit is pretty plain, compared to the rest of the KoB—which makes sense, since half the time, Karma isn’t even technically a guild member. Her cloak has remained consistent throughout the game, although she’s made a few little changes here and there to the rest. Her armor has been upgraded a few times, but it’s still relatively lightweight. Her main occupation is being speedy, agile DPS, like Asuna, so she doesn’t need as much armor as a tank. She has more than Asuna, though, since sometimes she has to go up against heavy weapons whether she likes it or not.

Admittedly, she has zero traces of white on the rest of her wardrobe—simple, utilitarian, and inconspicuous. And also mostly black and red. The dark gray of her shirt under her jacket is her closest compromise to white.

Asuna levels a light-hearted glare at Karma. “Oh, believe me, I’ve tried so hard to get her to actually go shopping. Last time we all went on a shopping spree, guess what she bought.” She doesn’t give Kirito a chance to actually guess. “She bought gloves. One pair of white ones. And she doesn’t even wear them!”

Karma returns the look with her own pout, and explains to Kirito, “Heathcliff was kind of against it at first, but we had more important things to worry about, so he let it slide. Once I stepped down from sub-leader, he dropped the matter. I told the commander that I’ll blend in better as a more normal-looking player, given my role.” She shrugs. “As I don’t appear much publicly anymore, my wardrobe doesn’t matter.”

“He lets you get away with anything,” Asuna says with a scoff, only half-joking. To Kirito, she adds with her patented sarcasm, “S _he_ didn’t have to have her own personal stalker—excuse me, bodyguard.”

Karma’s lips twitch, despite her best efforts. “Are you still salty about that?”

Her eyes flash. “What do you think?!”

She and Kirito both wince at the volume of her voice. “Hey, okay, a bodyguard would’ve seriously interfered with my work. I love these guys, but none of them know the meaning of subtlety,” she says with an eyeroll, and Asuna scoffs.

“Too true…”

Suddenly, a message pops up in Karma’s HUD, and she excuses herself upon reading it. The door closes quietly behind her.

“You know, I always figured your commander would keep a closer eye on his right hand,” Kirito muses aloud.

Asuna notes that he says ‘your’, not ‘our’. “She’s been with him for longer than I have. She joined his party with Godfree and Uzala when they were still on Floor 1, in the first month of the game, before guilds even existed.”

“That long ago?”

“Yeah.” A small smile graces her lips. “I don’t think there’s anyone who knows him better than she does.”

It shows, when they let their guard down. Karma’s the only person Heathcliff would ever let tease him about how ridiculously expensive that mahogany desk in his study was. She’s the only one who pokes fun at how he has less of a fashion sense than she does. And Asuna’s pretty sure that no one else has blackmail on him other than Karma, to whom he lost a bet in a game of poker. He doesn’t like talking about it, and some might call it kindness, but Asuna’s pretty sure that the only reason Karma doesn’t tell people about it is so that she can hold it over his head and snicker at him every time she brings it up and his expression goes artfully blank. And she’s definitely the only person he would allow to do that.

“We were actually co-leaders of team B, but we split our duties,” Asuna continues. “She oversaw strategy, I oversaw training, and we both handled battlefield orders. After a while, she stepped down, and I took full command.”

Asuna knows that Karma doesn’t think about it like this, but she’s always imagined Karma to have unconsciously become the shadow of the Paladin. Heathcliff is the shining beacon at the head of the front line, who leads his army into a battle that people are staking hopes on so that they don’t have to fight themselves. Karma is his right hand. She too fights so that others don’t have to, but she runs alone into the battles that people don’t want to think about so that they keep not having to think about it.

And then there's the outfit. It's probably just coincidence, but whenever Asuna sees Karma standing by Heathcliff’s side, watching his back or working side by side with him, it feels almost as if Karma is _literally_ his mirroring shadow, dark and fleeting. His heavy, scarlet armor is meant to be imposing and bold; she hides a lot of her simple, light armor under her cloak intentionally. In public, she typically stands quietly a half meter or so behind him to his right, figure mostly hidden by her dark crimson, lusterless cloak, as if she _is_ the shadow he casts.

Both confident. Both intelligent. Both driven and deadly.

_“Thanks for seeing us off. Guild’s yours for the day, Asuna!”_

_“Us? Mine for the day? What are you talking about?”_

_No longer paying attention to the bewildered sub-leader, Karma grinned cheerfully around Asuna and waved. “Hey,_ danchou!”

_Asuna turned to see Heathcliff approaching, dressed in armor. “Wait, are you going with her?”_

_He nodded, and she stared at the two strongest KoB members, and two of the strongest in the game. “Both of you? Isn’t that a bit overkill?” Karma could usually take care of business by herself. For Heathcliff himself to join her…_

_“Not today, no,” Karma responded a little more seriously before jumping onto the teleport gate. Heathcliff joined her, and Asuna couldn’t help but stand a little straighter at the sight of the two KoB members standing side by side, light and dark together._

_Those player-killers were in for one_ hell _of a beat-down._

Kirito tilts his head curiously. “Why’d she step down?”

Asuna takes a deep breath, and tries to forget about that wispy porcelain girl who ran into the fire and acid without a single look back.

“She was starting to work solo almost as soon as the guild was created. And she was a good leader. She still is. You’ve seen her at boss meetings. But once our guild started expanding, she had trouble integrating new, less experienced players into the mix, especially with her being gone so often. And sometimes, she forgot not everyone can handle danger as well as she can.”

The commander himself is like that too, so that's probably where Karma got it from. If your HP isn't in the red and you're clear of debuffs, you're still fit to fight. It works great between the two of them, especially on Karma's end.

"I trust his judgement," she once said with a casual shrug. "If he says I can still fight, I can still fight. If he needs me to fight, then I'll do it."

(When Asuna asked sarcastically about the times he would tell Karma to take a damn break for once, she just grinned cheekily and said, “Well, he doesn’t know everything.”)

But it doesn't work like that for everyone.

Asuna smiles wryly, a little proud and a little sad. “She keeps her cool better than anyone I’ve ever seen. And in heated conflict, it can be encouragement to the troops. But it’s also good to remind them that you’re human, just like them, and, well, she’s always been just a little too good at hiding it.”

Even from her own friends and family. And despite every other horror that Asuna has witnessed over the last two years, she’ll never get used to that kind of pain that comes from telling her best friend that she can lean on her too, and then watching the other girl smile a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes and lie right through her teeth that everything is just fine.

She talks to Heathcliff. And Asuna knows that most of the guild would laugh at the mere notion of their stoic, fearless commander being someone to go to for heart to hearts (not that that would be the case for anyone but Karma), but he’s a good listener, and he would never divulge the secrets that Karma trusts him with.

Asuna gets scared sometimes. Because what if he leaves, and then who would Karma go to? Keeping secrets bottled up wears on people. But, Asuna reasons, out of all the players in the game, Heathcliff is probably the least likely to die on them, so everything’ll be alright, won’t it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, yes, everything will DEFINITELY be alright.
> 
> The first one was inspired by the SAO Material Edition 4, where Asuna and Kirito catch colds in real life and have to take care of each other XD The second one was because I imagine Asuna was SUPER pissed off about the whole bodyguards thing. The third one was just a bit of character study? Is that what it's called? Also, this is an SAO fic and Kirito barely shows up, so XD I had intentions of writing more about Karma being a co-sub-leader, and showing the problems that Asuna was talking about, but I guess I never got around to it.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, yeah, remember when I said the Laughing Coffin raid would probably be the longest chapter?
> 
> I lied.

**_Heavy: 10/23/2024_ **

The door bursts open, and there’s a whirlwind of crimson before Asuna feels all the air being squeezed out of her. “K-Karma!”

Karma buries her face in her best friend’s shoulder, drawing in a deep, shuddering breath. “Thank god you’re okay…”

Asuna’s surprise turns to sorrow, and she returns the embrace tightly. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t save Godfree.”

She shakes her head, temporarily speechless. Heathcliff’s message, while informative, did nothing at all to comfort her as she dropped everything she was doing to come here. The whole time, everything was just a blur of shock; the grief only hit when she saw Asuna and Kirito standing there without Godfree.

Her hand flies out to snag Kirito’s collar as he tries to sidle away to give them privacy, and she yanks him into a gentle embrace.

“Thank you for being there,” she whispers, holding the younger teenagers close.

“I'm sorry,” he whispers, guilt-stricken. “If it wasn’t for me, maybe Godfree-”

“We don't know that,” she interrupts gently but firmly before he can go too far down this path, one well-travelled by herself. “I'm just glad that you had Asuna’s back.”

After a moment, Kirito’s stiff posture loosens, and he gives a hoarse laugh of raw warmth. “She was the one who saved me.”

Asuna adjusts herself to put an arm around Kirito. “We saved each other,” she says, and despite the gray sadness of Godfree’s death, Karma can sense something new, yet familiar, peeking through—a sliver of sunshine. What is dark, after all, but an excuse for light?

Karma draws back with a quiet sniffle, squeezing Asuna’s shoulders, smiling weakly. Later, she’ll let herself cry. But not right now. There’s work to do.

“I can take over team A,” she says aloud, glancing at a stoic Heathcliff. “Just until the boss battle. Then we’ll find a permanent leader.” The words leave behind a hollow feeling in her heart. Godfree is the only sub-leader—the first of the old guard—who has died since the formation of the guild. It’s been so long, and they’ve all miraculously survived up to this point, and now, losing one of their own feels like losing an arm or a leg.

He frowns thoughtfully. “Perhaps it would be better for you to take over team B.”

She blinks. “...I mean, I guess I know more of them. But they’re used to Asuna already. Well, then again, I guess team A would feel better being led by someone they all know.” She turns to smile at Asuna. “Just like old times?”

To her confusion, Asuna fidgets awkwardly in response. “...Um, actually, Kirito-kun and I are taking a temporary leave.”

Karma stares. “...Oh,” is all she can think to say.

Asuna looks down. “M-maybe I should stay. It’d be bad for the guild to be down two leaders so close to the boss battle-”

“No, you should take a break,” Karma cuts in quickly, grasping her shoulder with a smile. “I can handle things around here. I’ve done this before, after all. And you both deserve time off.” She pats them firmly on the backs. “So get going. Have fun. Don’t leave without saying bye, though.”

Asuna smiles hesitantly. “We wouldn’t dream of it.” She glances back at Heathcliff. “If that’s all, _danchou…?”_

He nods, pulling up his menu. With a few taps, the guild cross disappears from both Asuna and Kirito’s HP bars. They link hands like it’s the most natural thing to do, smile at each other, and leave.

Karma sighs, but Heathcliff catches her off guard with his own sigh. She cracks a small smile at their perfect synchronization, but it fades quickly.

“I still haven’t decided how I’m going to break the news to the guild,” he says, sounding simply exhausted. She knows the feeling.

“About what? About Kuradeel and Godfree? About Asuna’s leave?” she asks quietly.

“All of it. With both Godfree and Asuna gone, the first and second armies are both left without a leader.”

“You don’t have to worry about that. I’ll take both of them.”

He glances at her. “Both?”

“We should only be two or three weeks from finding the boss room. I can handle two groups of ten each until then. When the time for battle comes, Asuna can resume leadership.”

Heathcliff shakes his head. “You can take team B until Asuna returns. But I also need you to stay on the tail of PoH until then.”

“I will. But too many of team A’s members are newcomers from the second army, given the losses we sustained on Floor 67. I know there are veterans in there, but none that are suited for leading.”

“You’re right,” he admits. “But PoH is a priority. You’ll lead team B, but I think it would be better off for Uzala to take over team A. They know him better, and frankly, he has more experience with the job than you do.” He sighs again. “Also, Godfree and Asuna were both players that I typically brought for floor boss strategy meetings between guilds, as well as Uzala. I’ll need you to fill in there, too.”

She nods reluctantly. She not keen to put running two teams on Uzala’s shoulders, especially so soon after this loss, but it’s probably the best in the short run. “That makes sense...Hopefully, we’ll find PoH soon.” Her fists clench, and the fabric of her gloves stretches from the pressure. “If it wasn’t him, someone else recruited Kuradeel into what’s left of the Laughing Coffin.” The sad thing is, Godfree probably wasn’t even Kuradeel’s target; his target was Kirito, and Godfree happened to be there.

“Are you sure you can handle it?” he asks, metallic eyes serious. “It’s been a long time since you did this.”

She shakes herself briefly. “Yes,” she says, as firmly as she can. “I can do it. I’m familiar with a lot of team B already, and I won’t let up on PoH either. They’re both equally important. We have to be ready for the boss fight, and a player killer can’t stay on the loose either.”

After a moment of consideration, he nods, albeit reluctantly. “Very well. Shall I inform them?”

“I’ll tell them.”

“Then I’ll tell the guild about Kuradeel and Godfree,” he sighs, and she nods, sobering at the mention of the late sub-leader.

Before her emotions get the better of her, she turns to leave. “I’d better get going.” There’s a lot to do, after all.

\---

Karma sees the couple off at the teleport gate.

“So,” she says, forcing a cheerful tone. It’s what Godfree would’ve done. “Where are you guys going for your leave?”

They exchange a shy, happy look, and Karma’s heart warms.

“We’re going to Floor 22,” Asuna declares, smiling widely. “We’re buying a house there.”

“Good. It’s about time,” she states, to the younger players’ consternation. “Let me know when you pick a house. I’ll pay for it.”

Predictably, Asuna says, “What?! No way! You’re not giving us any money!”

And Kirito just asks, “Are you seriously rich enough to buy us a house?” Asuna whacks him over the head, to his indignation.

“No arguments, and yes, I should be,” she says with a sunny smile, steepling her fingers. “Floor 22 was that floor with no field bosses and lots of lakes, right? It looked pretty affordable.”

“No, no, no, you’re not buying us a house,” Asuna argues, gesturing emphatically.

“I said no arguments!”

“We’re already causing enough trouble by leaving so abruptly; we don’t need to burden you any more. Besides, we’re good for it.”

“Well, so am I!”

Wisely, Kirito steps back and lets the girls duke it out.

Finally, Karma says, “At least let me pay for half of it! My baby sister’s getting married, for god’s sake. And it won’t come fully furnished, so you need money for that.”

Asuna wavers, and gives in at last. “Fine. But no more than half!”

Karma allows a smile to spread across her face, and tears sting her eyes again. These are of a different kind, though. She hugs Asuna one more time, and ruffles Kirito’s hair, both girls chuckling at his indignant face.

“Let me know when you decide on a house. Have fun on your honeymoon, and make sure to rest up.” They’d all need their energy for the fights to come.

“Don’t overwork yourself,” Asuna reminds her.

When they disappear in an orb of blue light, Karma lets her smile drop, and she sighs heavily. She’s already tired.

\---

In a kind of stunned daze, teams A and C and the second army leave the training grounds. Team B stays, as requested by Karma. Uzala was already notified in private by herself and Heathcliff, but the pain is still raw and fresh. His typically impish, cheerful expression is dull with sadness and grief, and it hurts her heart to see.

Heathcliff glances at her, and she nods slightly; he returns the gesture before leaving. She tries to smile briefly at the players she knows (pitifully few, but she tries not to dwell on the various reasons for that), and takes a deep breath.

“In light of Godfree’s death and Asuna’s temporary leave,” she begins, projecting her voice, “I will be taking command of team B.”

The ripple of murmurs don’t surprise her. The blatant distrust in some of the Knights’ expressions does, and she falters.

Confident. She has to be confident.

“For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Karma,” she continues, forcing the waver out of her voice. “Until the boss battle, I’ll be directing training and such, like Godfree and Asuna did. During the battle, Asuna will resume command.”

“Wait, we don’t even know you,” one young man blurts out indignantly. “We can’t just trust you with our lives!”

“You don’t have a choice,” she says evenly. “We’re only a week or two away from finding the boss. It’s not enough time to find another sub-leader.” At his expression, mirrored by some of the other players, she forces her tone to soften, though it sounds fake. “I do understand your concern. You don’t know me, and that’s fair. But I am not new to this job. When the guild was first formed, I was a sub-leader of team B. And I can assure you, we’re fighting for the same thing—to beat this game. I’m going to be really busy in the next few weeks, but I plan to do everything I can to make sure you’re all prepared for the fight to come.”

“Why can’t one of us lead?” The same person from before steps forward defiantly. “We know each other better than you do. And personally, I don’t exactly trust someone with so many deaths to their name. Do you even know how many people you’ve killed?!”

That hits her hard. For a second, she can’t move, can’t breathe, because she doesn’t have an answer-

“Hey, cool it,” one of the older Knights says sternly, and Karma breathes quietly in relief when she recognizes him as one of the veterans. “We’ve all had to do questionable things. You’ve only been with us for two months. She’s been with us for two years, longer than almost all of us. Uzala-san is the only one who’s known the commander for longer. Right, Karma-san?”

“Except for Godfree, yes,” she agrees softly, dipping her head in both agreement and gratitude. What’s super ironic is that the guy supporting her now is actually the guy who first opposed her and Asuna’s sub-leadership at the beginning of the guild. It seems so far away now.

“And she’s a good leader!” another voice butts in. “She’s kept us alive and saved us more times than we can count!”

She can’t help but smile when she recognizes Kili, even as she feels a pang of guilt. She hasn’t seen him in a while, let alone talked to him. It’s been far too long...Maybe this won’t be such a bad thing, if she gets to catch up with old friends.

To Karma’s relief, the dissenter subsides at that, muttering to himself under his breath. She looks around, and while some people still look uncertain, there are more who are nodding along with Kili, mostly those who she knows already.

“Okay,” she says finally, with a smile she doesn’t totally feel, “if there are no more questions, let’s get started. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

\---

Karma is tired. She wants nothing more than to go to her room (it’s basically her room now; Asuna doesn’t really use it much anymore), take a long, hot shower, and probably sob into her pillow after looking at the picture frames on her desk. Asuna won’t even be there to watch her bawl her eyes out like a baby; it’ll be perfect.

These days, though, even the lack of company isn’t good enough for her to take off her mask, and she’s running out of places where she can feel like being weak is acceptable.

Heathcliff doesn’t look up at the sound of the door opening and closing. Few people would be here so late at night (or early in the morning), and only one would just walk in without an invitation.

With an exhausted huff, Karma curls up in the chair like usual, and he asks, still studying the holographic map, “How was it?”

“Well,” she sighs, “if you exclude some of the newbies that think I’m a bloodthirsty maniac, and the fact that despite what I said, I’ve kind of forgotten how training runs, and the three dead ends that I ran into while looking for PoH in the last six hours, it was wonderful. Not tiring at all.”

Ignoring the sarcasm in her voice, he looks up at her carefully. “They think you’re a bloodthirsty maniac?” he echoes, a touch of disbelief in her voice.

She hugs her knees to her chest, her gaze sharp and full of hurt. “Some of them know better. Know _me_ better. More don’t. All they know is what I did to Laughing Coffin.”

Heathcliff stares at her levelly. He’s not going to rehash what he said to her after the raid, because they both know she remembers.

Finally, he says, “I’m trying to plan the best route to take us through the dungeon for the boss raid. Come take a look at the map.”

That was Godfree’s job. Ever since the Laughing Coffin raid, Karma’s been too busy chasing the escapees down.

With a sigh, she ties up her hair into a loose ponytail to keep it out of the way and scoots around the table to sit down next to Heathcliff in front of the map. “What’ve we got?”

About an hour later, it’s three in the morning, and they’ve planned out a route up to where the map data ends.

“I’d offer to scout it out, but I don’t think I have the time,” Karma sighs, yawning.

He nods absently. “I figured.”

Karma rubs her eyes and curls up tighter in her chair, much like a cat, resting her head on the desk with a tired groan. She hasn’t been out in the field much on this floor, being preoccupied with the rest of Laughing Coffin, but she’s heard that it’s already taken lives. The difficulty spike has gone up yet again, like it did on Floor 25, and 50.

How many players are they going to lose this time?

Her red-clad fists clench on the arm of her chair when she thinks of Godfree, and tears spring to her eyes unbidden. He wasn’t supposed to die in an easy dungeon raid at the hands of a Laughing Coffin traitor. He wasn’t supposed to die at all, especially not to another player. None of them were.

She still remembers her first few unsure days spent with what would eventually become the KoB—solemn Heathcliff, restless Uzala, and cheerful, boisterous Godfree, who made her crack a smile when the hole in her heart thought she never would again. Heathcliff’s calm, Uzala’s energy, and Godfree’s enthusiasm had given her hope, a precious resource that was hard to come by those days. Even now, when she’s become a veteran in her own right, they remain her pillars of support she thought she could lean on whenever she needed to.

When she starts crying, there’s a quiet sigh, followed by a steady hand on her back, and she finds herself crying into his shoulder. The last time she had to was after the Laughing Coffin raid, less than three months ago. Since when has she turned into such a crybaby?

“This shouldn’t have happened,” she sobs, her words barely intelligible. “I wanted to think it was over...How do they keep taking people from us?! What was even the point of all the people I killed if more just keep coming?!”

The fears that have been festering inside of her since Godfree’s death—no, since way, way before then, even before the Laughing Coffin raid—come to light, digging their claws into the cracks in her heart and pulling hard. Combined with the constant running around today, enduring the suspicion from her own guild members, and her complete failure to find a single piece of useful information on PoH, the walls around her feel like they’re closing in faster than ever, and she’s afraid they’re going to crush her before this death game is over.

Heathcliff is silent, even as she keeps rambling brokenly, about anything and everything.

“We fought together for so long…” she whimpers in anguish. “He made all these stupid jokes, and I was the only one who would laugh...He was the one who figured out that ale was actually sake in that one tavern, and then everyone got crazy drunk...He told me about his wife and daughter in the real world...I haven’t even been a guild member for so long, I don’t even remember the last time I talked to him!”

She doesn’t know how long she sits there crying, but it feels like a long time until the tears start to dry. She knows she should probably move, but it’s warm…

“You can stay as long as you need to,” he murmurs suddenly, startling her; it’s like he read her mind.

So she yawns quietly and remains there, watching as he cracks open a book. “Oh my god, is that a book that’s not _Wuthering Heights?_ Who _are_ you?” she jokes weakly, voice thick.

She can _feel_ him rolling his eyes.

As the time ticks by, she feels her eyelids growing heavy. She knows you can’t exactly suffer from stiffness or soreness in the game, but sitting perfectly still isn’t easy either, and Heathcliff hasn’t moved a muscle.

“Are you okay?” she finally asks him.

Unexpectedly, he lets out a short huff of laughter, finally shifting. “Why do you ask?” A question to answer a question. Classic.

“It’s okay if you’re not, you know,” she mumbles. “When it’s just us.” He taught her that.

He takes a deep breath, and his shoulders slump slightly. “I’m the most okay when it’s just us,” he says softly.

Karma straightens up, staring at him with wide eyes, and he blinks a few times, seeming almost uncomfortable, his fingers brushing across the book forgotten on his desk. His gaze slides away, as if he’s embarrassed.

“I’m glad I met you,” she breathes out, smiling with the most happiness she’s felt today. It’s muted still, and not quite _happy,_ but she doesn’t have to pretend right now.

Shock flits across his face for a split second, replaced immediately by doubt. “Really?”

She snorts softly, folding her arms on the top of her chair and leaning sideways against the back. “You sound so surprised. Yes.” She hesitates, trying to think of how to put her feelings into comprehensible words. “It’s...hard to explain. But when I think about it...all the choices I’ve ever made...I’m glad it all happened. I’m glad I made all those choices, even the stupid ones, because if I didn’t, I might not have met you. My past regrets…” She taps her fingers with a hum. “Somehow, it’s so easy to forget all of it when I think about what I have now,” she finishes, ducking her head slightly; it’s her turn to feel a bit embarrassed.

Heathcliff stares at her, looking highly intrigued by her rambling reasoning. He folds his arms on the desk, head still turned towards her as he seems to think through her words. Finally:

“I think I’ve made more bad choices than good ones in my life,” he says, and then chuckles, lifting one hand to rub at his forehead. “Actually, that doesn’t even begin to cover it. But from a completely, extremely selfish standpoint…” The corner of his lips quirks up in a tiny smile. “Sword Art Online was my best choice for all the same feelings you just somehow put into words.”

\---

_** A Day Off (Pt. 2): 10/31/2024 ** _

Karma sits down heavily just inside of the Black Iron Palace, leaning back against one of the support pillars, and puts her head down on her knees with a long, long sigh.

“That’s certainly a melancholy sound. You did just make a rather hefty breakthrough.”

Her head jerks up at the familiar voice. _“Danchou?”_

Heathcliff extends a hand to pull her to her feet, and she sighs as she reaches up to take it. “Finding that guy was good. But he wasn’t my main target.”

One hand squeezes her shoulder reassuringly. “You did well. Why don’t you take the rest of today off?”

As much as she really, really wants to… “Can’t. I was going to take the army out for some more levelling before the boss fight. Besides, what else would I do?”

“That wasn’t a suggestion.”

“...eh?”

His metallic gray eyes glint. “Remember in June, you were nagging me about being a workaholic, and forced me to take a night off?”

Her lips part slightly as she tries to remember; at last, she does, and she sighs. “No, this is-”

“This is not different,” he interrupts firmly before she can get another word out. “You’ve been running yourself ragged. You need to take a break. The others have a Halloween party planned out.” The faintest hint of amusement flickers through his expression. “If it serves as any consolation, I’ll be coming too. And as a warning, I’m only the advance party. If you don’t comply, Uzala, Kili, Muldar, and Fultz intend to forcefully abduct you.”

She rubs her forehead tiredly. Only a week earlier, Godfree and Asuna would’ve been amongst their ranks. “Do they really think that’s possible?”

“More importantly, do you think it’s not possible?”

She has no answer for that.

“Fine,” she finally says, too exhausted to say no. If they got Heathcliff to play into this too, there’s no way she can wriggle out of this one. Besides, it’s not like she really wants to wriggle out of it either. A night off with the old guard sounds perfectly wonderful right now. With a smirk, she adds, “But only if I get to do your hair again like last year.”

He narrows his eyes. “I don’t know if you’re in a position to bargain…”

Karma’s smirk widens slyly. “Too bad. One way or another, I’mma make you pretty by the end of the night, and that’s a promise.”

\---

They meet up in the common room of the castle later, and Uzala, black cape flapping ridiculously, pounces as soon as she walks in through the door. “You call that a costume?” he mocks playfully, slinging an arm around her shoulders and pretending to bite her neck with his fake vampire fangs. “Omnomnomnomnom.”

She places a gloved hand on his face and shoves, sending him sprawling dramatically to the floor. “That’s the worst vampire drinking blood sound I’ve ever heard. And in my defense, you gave me zero warning.”

“Taking my idea, I see,” Heathcliff remarks in a dry tone, crossing his arms.

“It’s not an idea. It’s literally the lack of an idea,” she retorts, mirroring the crossed arms. Like the commander, she was fresh out of ideas and just decided to let her hair down—or out, more like it. She did manage to get all the tangles out, so for now, her hair is chaos but organized chaos, although that probably won’t last long.

“She’s got you there,” Muldar snickers, leaning on his cheap samurai sword and looking extremely strange in his hakama and haori.

“Besides, I’m being more creative than you.” She pats the braid wreath on the side of her head. “See? It’s Asuna’s hairdo!”

“Since when did you have so much hair?” Fuldar asks Karma in complete bewilderment. He’s dressed as a stereotypical fairy tale prince, which Karma finds funny, given his decidedly un-princelike attitude.

“Yeah, well, this is why I keep it neat and organized,” she says wryly, floofing her bristling mane. “So, where are we going?”

“You’ll see when we get there,” assures Kili, who’s dressed, for some reason, as a cat boy, furry paws and ears and tail and all, with black whiskers drawn on (likely by himself in a mirror, if their crookedness is anything to go by). “Let’s go!”

“...Where did you even get that costu-”

“We’re not talking about that!”

\---

Karma can’t help but smile when she sees their destination. “Aww, I love this place!”

The guys exchange a surprised look before Uzala sighs. “Of course you know this place.”

Her lips quirk in amusement. “Were you planning on surprising me?”

“A little,” Kili admits sheepishly. “You’ve been super busy, so we thought it might be a nice way for all of us to unwind and have some fun.”

Karma’s heart warms at the thought, and she slings her arms around Uzala and Kili, the two who happen to be flanking her, and marches them towards the door. “Let’s go, then!”

Karma walks into the little pub first, a confident, cheerful swagger in her step, and is greeted with enthusiasm from the NPCs (after coming here so often, the game apparently registered her as a ‘regular’ and altered the NPC behavior accordingly) and from some players. She greets the players warmly, surprised that some of her old peers still come here regularly. It certainly has been a while, with everything that’s been going on. Between the aftermath of Floor 67 and the Laughing Coffin raid and what happened just recently, it feels like time has stretched on and on and on.

“Come back to reinforce your record?” an old friend asks cheerfully from the adjacent table.

“Well, depends on if anyone’s beaten it yet,” she says with a wink after ordering coffee from the NPC waitress.

“Are you kidding? 49-0-0 doesn’t make an easy record to beat.”

Heathcliff looks mildly impressed. “You have a 49-0-0 record here?”

“Yeah, sure. It was a while ago, but me and Asuna used to love coming here on our down time.”

“Since when?” he asks, sounding perplexed, for once.

She raises her eyebrows and snarks, “My life doesn’t revolve around you, you know.”

The other guys snicker at that, and Heathcliff looks mildly surprised before shooting back at her, “Your job begs to differ.”

They laugh louder at that, and she deadpans.

“So where’s your costume?” her old friend asks. “It’s Halloween, in case you missed the memo.”

“Well, I didn’t have much time before these lunatics dragged me out here,” she says with a teasing glare at the other KoB members. “Wait. No, actually, I might…”

She opens up her inventory, scrolling through it to find… “Aha!”

With a grin, she stands up and taps her menu.

Instantly, her outfit, sans her crimson cloak, is replaced in a shower of pixels by a flashy white outfit, not unlike Asuna’s, with bright steel and the occasional dash of red. It’s extremely old, not to mention outdated, and the armor would not hold up in a fight on Floor 75, but Asuna made her get a KoB uniform for ‘formal occasions’. When it became clear that formal or not, Karma was never going to use that uniform, she kind of gave up. Who knew it would come in handy now? Plus, with Asuna’s hairstyle, if she just dyed her hair auburn, she could pass for Asuna from earlier in the game (albeit Asuna with bedhead, but Karma gave up a long time ago on getting her unruly mane to behave when loose).

“I can’t believe I didn’t think of this last year. So!” She stabs her sword into the floorboards with a dramatic flair (unconsciously imitating a certain leader, who does the same with his tower shield before every boss fight) and then flashes a peace sign at her stunned friends. “Who’s gonna be my 50th win here?”

\---

Karma staggers back to her seat with a delighted wheeze. “I have to say,” she laughs in exhilaration, practically collapsing in her chair, “I did not expect that out of you!”

Heathcliff sits back down next to her as well with a shake of his head, for once out of breath. “I could say the same of you.”

Apparently, the others _very conveniently_ neglected to tell him that this place was for _dancing,_ not duelling. Karma’s record was established by winning forty-nine straight dance-offs. One thing’s for sure; she’s not going to forget the look on Heathcliff’s face when the beat dropped. They’d gone for something a tad bit faster-paced than their usual, but when his initial shock wore off, he seriously put her perfect record in jeopardy.

She laughs, mussing her already tangled hair with one hand. “It’s my combat footwork. It just flows into dancing. Gotta admit, you kept up with me pretty well.” She gives him a thumbs up and a wink. “I respect.”

He just picks up his coffee mug. “I’ve danced with you before, just not quite like that. And compared to all the crazy things you do when we’re fighting, it wasn’t too much of a stretch.”

She beams at him. “It _is_ like fighting, isn’t it? Except one wrong move on the dance floor would only lead to a loss of dignity, perhaps.”

Just then, another upbeat, funky song comes on, and at an enthusiastic invitation from one player, people start getting up and gathering on the dance floor as one big group. The guys are happy to join in, although Karma and Heathcliff elect to sit out, as they just got off the floor.

“Thanks for inviting me tonight,” she says with a grateful smile. “I feel a lot better than I have since…” She sighs. “Since Godfree died.”

His metallic eyes are knowing. “I suspect it would be easier to bear if you hadn’t insisted on juggling all of your duties.”

In the past week or so, she quickly learned the hard way that Godfree did a lot more than she thought he did. Granted, she’s been pretty much absent from Granzam for the past two or three months, but still. Besides leading Team A, he also did a bunch of stuff unofficially, like helping organize mat gathering, making sure equipment is always up to date, keeping in touch with other mid-level guilds—stuff that doesn’t really come to light until there’s no one to do it anymore.

“Who else do you have? I wasn’t about to leave running the entire first army to Uzala. And I’m not going to leave tracking down Laughing Coffin to anyone else,” she says grimly, cradling her coffee in both hands.

“There is some ground to that, I’ll admit.” he concedes. “But the effort of trying to do it all at once is compromising that.”

She takes a deep breath, staring down at her dark reflection in her drink. “One more week...Then we’ll look at other options.”

“I’m holding you to that,” he warns lightly, but she knows he’s not joking. “I’m not going to let you try to play Atlas for much longer.”

Karma glances at him in slight perplexment. “Atlas?”

“The titan condemned to hold up the weight of the universe for eternity. It’s a Greek myth.”

She narrows her eyes, wrinkling her nose at him. “That applies more to you than it ever did to me.”

He tilts his head in concession with a wry smile, lifting his coffee mug. “That’s why we’re both here.”

She agrees with a rueful smile and a nod; then something occurs to her.

“I have to do your hair!” she exclaims, nearly knocking over her chair in her haste to stand up. “Sit still.”

He tries to turn away, but her hands are too fast. “Karma-”

“Don’t worry, I won’t give you anything _too_ cutesy. But since I’m pretty much Asuna with black hair right now…”

The others nearly die laughing when they come back to see Karma looking very pleased with herself and Heathcliff looking not so pleased with her, sporting a cute pair of twin braids.

\---

Karma is jerked out of a light doze by Uzala’s indignant voice.

“Oh, come on, is my story that not scary?!”

The others snicker, and she giggles, rubbing her eyes. “Sorry, sorry, I’m just a little tired.” Her changing back into more casual clothing probably didn’t help. “But yes, your story is lame.”

“Gee, thanks.”

She holds out her hand, wiggling her fingers. “Here, pass the lamp, I’ll tell one. Maybe that’ll keep me awake.”

For the last half hour or so, they’ve been taking turns telling spooky stories, gathered in the living room of Uzala’s apartment with cupcakes and drinks and only the fireplace and a flashlight for illumination. Against Heathcliff’s unimpressed attitude, they even built themselves a blanket and pillow fort and are huddled underneath it, their shadows flickering strangely.

Uzala actually hesitates. “...I don’t know if I want to hear what you come up with, but okay,” he finally says, passing over the glowing cube they’re using as a flashlight, and she takes it with a delighted giggle that seems to make him pale.

“So,” she starts, rubbing her gloved hands together diabolically. “A gal and her girlfriends went out for drinks one night. It’s late, and our favorite girl decides she should probably get home. Luckily, she’s sober enough to drive, and they bid farewell to each other in the parking lot.”

She hears a whimper from the shivering mound of blankets that Uzala has become, and Fultz kicks him. “Wuss.”

“No wonder why you can’t tell a scary story,” Muldar says snippily, grinning. “You can’t even stand hearing them.”

“Sh-shut up!”

Karma clears her throat to get their attention again.

“The highway is deserted as she drives. Not a single headlight in sight,” she continues, extinguishing the light cube for a second to emphasize. She turns it back on as she keeps going with the story: “Then, suddenly, she sees a pair of headlights behind her, coming up just a little bit faster than she’s driving…” She innocently looks at all of them to gauge their reactions, her expression light and casual. Kili is starting to inch away from her.

“She sees that he’s got the indicator on—he’s going to pass her. He starts moving to the side, and then he suddenly stops and pulls back behind her, flashing his headlights. Nervous, she speeds up slightly and tries to keep her eyes on the road, but through every stoplight, every turn, the stranger follows her home.”

Even the other guys are riveted, and she pauses a second for dramatics before continuing with the story, inwardly grinning. Maybe she can give Heathcliff a fright too.

“Finally, when she pulls into her driveway, her palms cold and clammy on the driver’s wheel, trembling uncontrollably in fear, she knows the stranger has followed her all the way home. She figures the only hope she has is to make a mad dash for the house and call 119 before it’s too late.” What Karma doesn’t see is her silhouette cast on the sheets behind her, her chaotic hair giving her the appearance of a bristling monster.

Uzala’s face is pale and drawn in the light, but he still leans in unconsciously with the others in anticipation.

“She takes a deep breath. Leap of faith!” She extinguishes the light cube again. “She kills the engine. She leaps out of the car. And as she does, so does the stranger.”

Karma doesn’t miss how Muldar and Fultz are staring at her with wide eyes, frozen in their seats, and she smiles serenely, narrowing her eyes slightly and tilting her head.

“Wanna know what he said as he plunged his hand into his pocket?”

She hears a whimper that she’s pretty sure came from Uzala, but she can’t be sure.

In a flash, she turns the light back on and screams, _“LOCK THE DOOR AND CALL THE POLICE!”_

Excluding Heathcliff, the guys all shriek like little girls, and Kili and Uzala are now hugging each other like drowning people clinging to their only source of buoyancy.

Karma wants to laugh off her head, but she resists—the story isn’t done. “You wanna know why?”

“W-we could do without, but I don’t think we have a choice,” Kili squeaks, his voice flying up an octave or three.

“No, you don’t. And neither did she. Because when the stranger flashed his headlights that first time on the highway, he saw a faceless silhouette rising from her backseat-” She materializes her spare knife from her inventory and raises it above her head, charging up a bloody red skill with a manic grin. “-butcher knife in hand!”

Nevermind that any silhouette is practically faceless; faceless people always add a thrill to the story. Evidently, the guys agree, because they freak out.

Muldar upends the mostly empty plate of cupcakes on the floor as he scrambles back against an armchair with a shriek; Fultz is frozen solid and just emits a frightened whimper; and Uzala and Kili scream again and are still clinging to each other. Even Heathcliff is looking at her with slightly wide eyes now, tense. Besides him, everyone looks _petrified._

Karma dissolves into hysterics as well, but quite the opposite kind, and leans on Heathcliff’s shoulder as she laughs herself to tears. “You should see your faces!”

“That was not funny!” Uzala yelps, and she just laughs harder at his spectacular voice crack.

Fultz reaches over and snatches the flashlight, looking decidedly pale. “Okay, that’s the last spooky story today,” he declares in a rather high-pitched voice.

“Y’all are scaredy-cats,” she states, and sits back with her coffee to hide her smirk.

Muldar shakes his head, refilling his drink. “And you’re insane.”

“Flattery will get you everywhere.” She elbows Heathcliff playfully. “Did I scare you too, _danchou?”_

He rolls his eyes visibly. “Well, given everyone else’s reactions, I suppose I might as well admit that your story was...anxiety-inducing.”

She raises her cup slightly before downing the rest of it. “You know, I’ll take it.”

They lapse into silence, broken only by the fireplace crackling merrily on medium heat. Karma feels her eyelids getting heavy again, and she leans absently against Heathcliff. He adjusts his position, slouching a little bit so that her head rests a little more snugly against his shoulder.

All of a sudden, Uzala curses loudly. “Godfree should be here.”

The drowsy peace vanishes like a candle going out, and Karma sits up, a lump rising in her throat. “Uzala…”

The young man is staring at the floor with a clenched jaw, and burning blue eyes—but the anger is born of sheer grief and helplessness more than anything else. Then he blinks, the look shatters like a broken mirror, and he hangs his head miserably, shoulders hunched.

“Sorry,” he mumbles. “I totally ruined it, didn’t I.”

Karma scoots over, gently laying a hand on his shoulder. “Hey,” she says softly, and he looks up with an absolutely gut-wrenching look in his eyes, the one that pleads _‘fix this’_ when no one knows how. “Believe me, we’re all still feeling it.”

She wraps her arms around his shoulders, and after a moment, he returns the embrace, snuffling softly. They remain that way for some time.

“So is this all it takes to get a girl in your arms?”

A wet laugh bursts out of her, and she drives a fist into his gut. “You _ass.”_

He wheezes dramatically. “Hey, hey, I thought we agreed on no violence tonight!”

“No undeserved violence,” she corrects him with a grin, still hugging him.

“Yeah, that was totally deserved,” Kili comments as he joins in the hug, his short hair tickling Karma’s chin.

“Traitor.”

Finding a family here in SAO when she first logged in wasn’t something she ever expected to do. Logging into SAO wasn’t even something she really wanted to do; she only did it because her boyfriend’s puppy eyes and pleading got to her. She didn’t even think she would spend that much time in the virtual world.

Karma lifts her head from Uzala’s shoulder and turns. Heathcliff is still sitting where she left him, watching them all with an unreadable expression. She reaches out her hand to him, and his gaze flickers to the others in hesitation. But then he leans forward to take her hand, curling their fingers together, and she smiles and mouths, ‘You’re not alone either.’

When Kayaba Akihiko announced the death game, she was terrified. She went with her boyfriend beyond the walls of the Town of Beginning because she trusted his beta tester knowledge. In the end, that was what killed him, and gave her a new family. They more than fill that gap he left, and they make her happier than she’s ever been in her life, real or virtual.

\---

“You’re not serious.”

He simply fixes her with a look. “I have work to do.”

“You’re _impossible,”_ she moans in exasperation, dragging her feet as she plods after him through Granzam. “You know how much the others would _hate_ you for this?”

“I don’t know, in fact, and I don’t particularly care to either.” Luckily, the others don’t live at Granzam twenty-four seven anymore, and are currently passed out at their respective houses or apartments. “You can go to sleep, you know.”

“Tough luck, if you think you can get rid of me like that.” She ‘hmph’s, somehow managing to look _down_ her nose at him despite being several inches shorter? “No, you get to live with me complaining and whining about you and your workaholic maniac tendencies until you’re done with whatever crap you have to do, or until I drive you up the wall, whichever comes first. Come on, let’s go coffee.”

They stay up until around four before she falls asleep mid-sentence on his shoulder, her words trailing off into an incoherent jumble of mumbles. Once he’s sure she’s asleep, he drinks the rest of her coffee. With the backs of his fingers, he pushes some hair out of her face and stops to watch her sleep.

So...vulnerable.

He could’ve contentedly watched her sleep while he tried to figure out the mess inside his head, but he figures she could use the rest in her own bed, instead of one at some random ramshackle inn for once. With ease born of practice, he gathers her up and proceeds into the hallway.

What’s so special about her? Increasingly often these days, he wonders how they got here. How he got to the point of caring about whether she lived or died. He wouldn’t say he _cares,_ per se—or does he? He’s not sure—but...it’s not indifference, and that’s remarkable in itself.

She’s brave. So are plenty of other people still fighting in this game. Daring, selfless, protective. Again, not unique traits. Her skill in battle? Well, Kirito also interests him, as does Asuna, but not in the same way that Karma does.

He gets her settled into bed and all tucked in, and she barely stirs. He accidentally lightly bumped her against the headboard while lost in thought, but she just kept on sleeping, and he realized something.

They don’t really do field exploration anymore. At least, he and Karma don’t. But when they were all just members of a party, camping out in the middle of nowhere between towns, rotating watch shifts, all you had to do was _poke_ her and she’d bolt awake in an instant (they preferred to do it with Uzala’s two-meter long glaive, in case she woke up feeling violent). At times, when the current watch was half-asleep, she’d be the first one to hear very distant monster calls and be woken up by them. There were multiple instances when the others said, “Do we need a watch? Karma can keep watch in her sleep.”

(They tried it once, but it turned out Karma got too nervous to even fall asleep, so that didn’t exactly work.)

Watching her sleep so absurdly dead to the world, hair flopping into her face, jaw slack, Heathcliff thinks he knows what it is.

She trusts him. She confides in him like she doesn’t the others, and that is an extraordinary feeling, to know that someone would give their everything to you if you asked.

How _did_ they get here? Somewhere along the way, it just...happened.

It’s slightly unsettling. Cause and effect, ones and zeroes, the world makes more sense when it follows the rules, except there are none, and sometimes-

Sometimes things just happen for no apparent reason.

If this could truly last, he thinks to himself wistfully as he leaves, maybe he wouldn’t mind it too much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote both of these a while ago too (I mean, pfft, whyever would I write in chronological order, which would be much more logical and actually make sense?), but they were super rough (some parts probably still are), so I had to do some editing and woah, where did those extra 1k words come from?
> 
> (oops.)
> 
> I debated splitting them into two parts (because they're both long enough to be separate chapters...) but they kind of go together, so I left them as they were.
> 
> (Also yes, Godfree still died. I'm sad too)


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops. Got a little sidetracked these past two weeks XD

**_Darkness Blade: 11/1/2024_ **

Karma backs up slowly, well aware of the foaming water tearing past her and over the edge of the cliff mere meters behind her. A fall now means certain death, especially with her HP barely hanging in the yellow.

PoH advances with each step she retreats, his grisly ‘Mate Chopper’ swinging lazily at his side in his hand. An equally grisly smile stretches across his face.

“How does it feel?” he croons now, triumph oozing from his voice; it sharpens to a cobra’s hiss. “To have the hunter become the hunted?”

She scoffs, inwardly scrambling for something to buy time. “Sure, because you were too chicken to come after me with less than a whole party of reinforcements…” All of whom she’s already killed, at the cost of a solid chunk of her HP. They were considerably more competent than the typical Laughing Coffin foot soldier.

In an attempt to buy time for her battle regen skill, she asks, “How are you ripping through my armor like that? I know you can’t be that much higher-levelled than me.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” he says, seeming amused by her stalling. “Well, I suppose you might as well know how you’ll die.”

Arrogance, all of it. She wants to punch him in the face.

“It’s a unique skill. Darkness Blade,” he proclaims proudly.

“What?!” she snaps, narrowing her eyes angrily at his declaration. “How would _you_ get a unique skill?”

He sneers. “Your exalted commander and that dual-wielder aren’t _special._ You think the game gives the skills out on the basis of, what, heroic acts of virtue?”

Evidently not. “Well, what were the requirements for yours?” she asks, scowling. Her heel teeters over the edge of the cliff.

“Well, I’m glad you asked,” he says, obviously pleased. “Neither the Paladin or the Black Swordsman specified any requirements they had to meet. But there were some unique skills that were talked about in the beta. There’s Battoujutsu, unlocked by maxing out the katana skill…” A grotesque, smug grin stretches across his face. “I’d wager you were close.”

When he doesn’t elaborate, she growls, “Close to what?”

“To unlocking Darkness Blade.” He tilts his Mate Chopper, letting the weak sunlight glint off the wicked edge. “You see, it goes to the one with the most player kills.”

Steel rings furiously as she sprints in and slams her sword against his knife. Blood roars in her ears, and she feels sick to the stomach as she wonders how many have perished, screaming and begging, to this very knife.

She doesn’t even know anymore how many people she’s killed herself. So how many more has he murdered?

And that’s not even counting the deaths that he orchestrated like a puppet master through leading Laughing Coffin.

_Godfree…_

“Unique skills aren’t everything,” she hisses, circling him warily. “I’ve beat Heathcliff before.” A long time ago, and before he got his unique skill, admittedly, but still.

PoH doesn’t respond, simply watching her carefully. Like most people, he’s right-handed and probably doesn’t have much experience fighting left-handed people. Despite their animosity towards each other, Karma has never actually fought him before—he’s never quite been brave enough to stand up to her face to face. His Darkness Blade makes it so that she has to be extra careful not to let him touch her at all, or he’s just going to shred through her light defense. It’s not too different from fighting Heathcliff—letting either land even a single direct strike is dangerous—but PoH is unfortunately faster than the heavily armored Paladin.

Still, Karma has some distinct advantages. Her levels are almost certainly higher. She’s been the highest-levelled player in the game for several months now, as far as she’s aware. Although, her levels partly come from killing so many players, so PoH might not be that far behind her. He doesn’t participate in boss battles and dungeon raids, though, so she’s willing to bet that her levels are still higher.

And PoH relies on sword skills still, unlike Karma, who only uses them sparingly. She has more experience against decent fighters. A majority of PoH’s victims were likely mid-level players. She’s heard stories from survivors about how he would let his underlings weaken most of the victims before going in for the execution himself.

If Karma was at full health, she’d say she has the advantage right now. But she’s on the border of red, so she’s still at a disadvantage.

Fine. She’s had worse.

The skies open wide then, the weak sunlight disappearing altogether as it begins to pour. Even better. Karma’s fought in pouring rain before.

She’s not one for battle cries, but as she charges in with renewed fire, she roars, “This is for Godfree, you bastard!”

\---

When Uzala spots a dark figure trudging into the courtyard, he bolts over. “Karma! You’re ba…you look like hell.”

She rolls her eyes as his grin slides right off his face—and for good reason. “Yeah, I know, thanks.”

He can tell immediately that it wasn’t a triumph, from her slack body posture and downcast gaze, her hand keeping a tight grip on her sword handle, and the distinct lack of energy in her sarcasm. Red pixels are still flaking off of her many wounds, even as her HP ticks steadily up after taking a potion, not to mention she’s soaking wet, her clothes are caked in mud in some places, and there are twigs sticking out of her hair here and there.

“I gotta talk to Heathcliff,” she says with a hollow sigh, giving him a lackluster pat on the shoulder as she drags herself off in the direction of the main tower. All the energy and liveliness of the Halloween party seems to have totally deserted her.

\---

Heathcliff looks up when she trudges into his office. “Karma. You-”

“Look like hell, so I’ve been told,” she mutters, kicking the door shut behind her and dragging herself over to her chair.

He doesn’t refute that statement. “He got away?” he asks quietly, probably reading the expression on her face like an open book.

She grits her teeth, and drags the words out of her throat by force. “I ran away.”

It’d been an uphill battle from the start; most of the fights she picks are. When he had her backed up to the cliff edge again and was closing in, his HP still hanging on the edge of yellow, she made her decision and jumped, teleporting away to Granzam with her last crystal.

Her logical mind knew that killing him was unlikely. She couldn’t have brought him down without going down with him. Even a victory like that, equal to defeat, wasn’t certain. If she tried, it would’ve been certain death for her, and _maybe_ death for him. But perhaps she would have landed a critical hit or something, or got lucky, if she just tried…

Would it be better? If she took both of them down? It would’ve been a coin toss. Either the red players would fall to pieces without their leader, or they would turn him into a martyr and fight even more viciously, and she wouldn’t be there to push them back. She’s seen it plenty of times, even in the smaller parties and guilds. Cut off the head, and the body either dies or resorts to violently thrashing about, anything to escape.

“Thank you.”

Her head jerks up. “What?”

Heathcliff blinks slowly at her. “Thank you,” he repeats evenly.

She opens and closes her mouth several times, utterly baffled. “For what?”

“For surviving.”

She sucks in a sharp breath, balling up her fists in the hem of her tunic; water seeps out. Puddles are forming on the floor as the corner of her cloak, and the ends of her pants, and her hair all drip steadily. SAO is very frequently _uncomfortably realistic._

“I could’ve killed him-”

“You would’ve died.”

“You don’t know-”

“Retreating to fight another day is a perfectly viable tactic,” Heathcliff says, raising his voice slightly to override her guilt-ridden protests.

“What if he kills more people when I could’ve-”

“Karma.” He steeples his fingers, leaning forward slightly. “I know you to be very, very reckless sometimes,” he says sternly. “Even when you’re backed against the wall, you often don’t flee. You risk your life to end it there. Somehow, you’re still standing. You’re _allowed_ to retreat and try again. You don’t have to get everything right on the first try.”

“I do when there are lives at stake!” she shouts, clenching her jaw.

Heathcliff remains unfazed, even when she raises her voice, which she can’t ever recall doing.

“Let me ask you something.” His steel eyes gleam quietly. “Why is it that you stay and fight when you know there’s a good chance you’ll die? You’re not exactly expendable, and we both know that.” She balks at that and what it implies, an argument reflexively springing to her lips, but he keeps speaking. “I know that there have been several times when you’ve had to let some of them flee, but you’ve always been able to hunt them down later. What’s the difference between that and _choosing_ to make another attempt later? I don’t see any. So why?”

Karma opens her mouth to say that it’s her job, what else is she supposed to do?

“Because I know that I can finish it there,” she finally says, surprising herself with the truth; then again, she’s never been able to lie to him. But it’s more than that that surprises her. When did she get to have so much confidence in herself?

Well, she thinks she knows the answer; it’s sitting right in front of her.

_“Believe in yourself, and what you are doing, and don’t look back. No matter what the cause, if you lack conviction, you’ll never achieve anything.”_

Heathcliff nods, with the look of someone who’s about to declare checkmate.

“And were you absolutely certain that you could’ve killed PoH if you hadn’t decided to run?” he asks calmly, fingers steepled.

She hesitates, but ultimately, she’s left unable to lie to her commander. “No.”

“Then I’m glad you decided to run.” He holds up a hand to forestall her arguments, his expression unreadable. “If there was even a chance that you would’ve thrown your life away for nothing...then I’m glad you didn’t take that chance.”

Karma takes a deep breath, forcing herself to unclench her fists. It still feels like she just ran away from her duty. And she knows that whenever she hears of another Laughing Coffin attack somewhere, or of PoH himself appearing to murder someone, she won’t be able to escape the guilt.

That’s fine. It’s good motivation, sometimes.

She asks if she can stay a little, he says sure, and silence settles over them both. He gets back to work, and she sits still. Her sense of duty is itching to drag her back into the field. She should probably go soon, maybe not back into the field necessarily, but back to work, at least.

Right now, though, she just wants to focus on breathing.

“I wonder,” she starts. She trails off, unsure of how to put this in a sensible way.

When she doesn’t elaborate, Heathcliff’s eyes flicker up. “Yes?”

She folds her arms on his desk and rests her chin on them morosely. “How many players do you think he’s killed?”

He ponders that for a moment, tracing the rim of his coffee mug idly. It’s the same one with the funny workaholic sayings that she got him last Christmas.

“Probably at least a hundred,” he finally estimates. “Not counting all those killed by other Laughing Coffin members.”

She sighs, only half thinking about it when she mumbles, “Maybe I should’ve killed more players.”

Karma can _feel_ him staring at her, and she groans, rubbing her eyes with one hand. “I mean, it’s not like I _want_ that skill. I can’t really think of anything more gruesome and horrifying. But it’s a thousand times worse in the hands of someone like PoH. If I had it…” She shifts uncomfortably in her seat. “Well, at least it might scare some more orange guilds into submission. And hopefully, I wouldn’t have abused it.”

“You wouldn’t have,” he agrees, to her mild surprise (and gratification). “You already hate killing with a passion. I think you’d just be even more terrified of it to even think about going in the other direction.”

She gives a small grimace-smile, watching the steam rise from his coffee mug jealously. “I guess.”

“Then again,” he sighs, absently shuffling through some of his paperwork, “if you did obtain the skill, you’d have to have committed a lot of murders to do so, so I’m not sure where your moral compass would lie after that. Butterfly effect.”

“Yeah, yeah…” She reaches up to run a hand through some of her hair that came loose of her tight braids. “I guess it’s a blessing in disguise. We shouldn’t be stooping to their level, and all that…” The weight of her sins are heavy enough as they are.

But if it was for Asuna, and Heathcliff, and Uzala, and the memories of all those they’ve lost, then she could find a way to bear more.

“I’d better get going,” she says, standing up with a sigh. Her HP is back up to high green, and there’s only a thin slice of red on her cheek left still flaking. Even as she speaks, the thin gash fades away. If only her exhaustion could do the same. “I’ll see if I can hit up Argo. She should probably know about the Darkness Blade too.”

“If you get a definite lead again, bring reinforcements,” he tells her seriously. “If need be, I’ll go with you myself.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know how his skill does against shields, but he can tear right through armor,” she counters. “That’s one of your main advantages. And he’s got high agility too. No offense, but you might end up only slowing me down, especially if he runs away. I’d need someone like Asuna.”

She can see the frustration flash across his expression for a moment. “Call on her, then, if you need to. Don’t be rash.”

Karma exhales through her teeth. “Yeah, I got it.” Asuna is probably the next best suited for the job, to be honest. Her armor is light enough that it shouldn’t make too much of a difference anyways, and she knows the mindset of having to avoid taking damage if at all possible. Still, the idea of dragging Asuna into this, especially in the middle of her honeymoon, doesn’t sit well with her.

“The endgame is slowly but surely approaching,” he murmurs thoughtfully, fingers steepled. His steely gaze fixes on hers. “I need you with me to see it through to the end.”

“I’ll be there,” she vows, with more confidence than she thought she had. “I promised, didn’t I?”

\---

_** Here to Stay: 11/6/2024 ** _

After something of a wild goose chase, Karma finds Heathcliff on a balcony on the seventh floor of the castle. “There you are.”

He stirs briefly, turning to glance back at her. “Did you need something?”

She quirks a brow at his tone—it’s a little...dull. It’s off. It makes her feel off too. “Is something wrong?”

He averts his gaze. “No.”

“Haha, you’re cute.” She walks over to the balcony and swings one leg over the wide stone railing, settling into a somewhat comfortable sitting position. Propping her elbows up on her knees, she leans in with an attentive expression. “So what’s wrong?”

With a heavy sigh, Heathcliff turns to look at her with a mild frown. “Has anyone ever told you how incredibly tactless you are?”

She scrunches her nose up at him. “You, mostly. And I’ll have you know, I am very tactful. It’s a job requirement.” Undeterred, she prods a bit more—he typically gives in eventually, if only to shut her up. “So what’s wrong?”

It’s November sixth, she realizes in the back of her mind, meaning it’s been two years since SAO began—exactly two years. In another five days, it’ll be two years since they met.

Her line of thinking isn’t completely off.

“My mother committed suicide today, a long time ago,” he says suddenly, and she sits up straighter, eyes wide. He takes a deep breath, shoulders tense with poorly suppressed emotion, and it makes his words bitter and his voice brittle. “And I remember feeling so unbearably angry at the world.”

His expression darkens with a cold, thunderous fury; it’s the same kind that she saw when he berated her after the Laughing Coffin raid. His hands curl into fists on the stone railing, voice trembles almost imperceptibly as he whispers, “All I could think was, how _dare_ you, for taking her away and then acting like everything is still fine.”

Karma can’t help but remember when they were talking about _Wuthering Heights._ He said then that he could relate to book Heathcliff’s revenge lust. She wonders if this is what he meant, and her heart aches, knowing no words can just patch up this old hurt. It’s been so long, and he _looks_ fine most of the time, but it clearly comes back to haunt him, like an injury that just healed wrong; he fixed himself, and it _works_ but the problems aren’t gone.

But she didn’t get this far by being a quitter. She too has old scars. Some days, they can be ignored, and then others, they can’t be. There are some mornings when she wakes up to no feeling in her hands and the inability to move her body, and it takes anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes to even think about getting up. Everyone has their scars, but that doesn’t mean they do nothing about them. And Heathcliff was never one to just stand by.

Quietly, she manually removes her gloves for the first time in over a year since she was captured, and reaches out to place her hand over one of his white-knuckled fists. He starts slightly at the unexpected contact, but she solidifies her grip gently. The touch of skin on her bare hand is not something she’s felt in a long time. His hand is warm, though, and slowly, he curls his fingers around hers with a long exhale. She too lets out a breath she didn’t know she was holding, mindlessly running the pad of her thumb along the back of his hand.

“Thank you,” he sighs, his metallic gaze downcast, fixed on their interlocked hands.

She simply smiles at him, more amused by his words than anything. “It’s nothing you haven’t done for me, y’know.” Whether it’s a few comforting words or simply spending lazy nighttime hours in his quiet office, she can always find solace in his companionship. To her, she’s just returning the favor.

“Sometimes I wish this could last forever.”

At his murmured words, she blinks in surprise, wondering if she’s just hearing things. “What do you mean?”

He looks out over the city, though he doesn’t let go of her hand. “It’s not a bad way to just live, compared to the real world.”

Oh. Heathcliff’s words settle heavily in her chest.

Between the deaths and the murders and the sadness and the monsters (not all of them AIs), there are brighter things. Stars still shine hopefully over the minefield. Karma has to watch her every step more than most, but there’s always time to appreciate the moments in between, and if there’s not, she’ll make the time.

Finally, Karma says, “I know. I feel the same way.”

“Then why do you still fight to end this world?”

“Why do you?” she counters, meeting his gaze evenly.

His broad shoulders lift and fall in a dull shrug. “What choice do I have? I can’t just quit now.”

A sad smile curls at her lips, and she says simply, “Yeah. That’s why I’ll be here too.”

Genuine surprise pierces through his tired demeanor, but she stays there, still holding onto his hand, with the same sad smile, and doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t have to.

It’s her turn to be surprised, though, when he leans forward and pulls her into a hug with his other arm, nestling his chin above her head. With a soft, fond hum, she places her free hand on his back. Every other embrace they’ve shared has been an attempt to comfort her, by him; this time, she can tell it’s the other way around. She doesn’t mind at all. It’s about time she made herself useful in that regard.

His words rumble in his chest. “Do you ever think about how you might die?”

“Um,” Karma says, somewhat at a loss, “sure. All the time.”

He leans back, tilting his head with a ‘go on’ look in his eyes, and she starts to realize how true her words ring.

“I’ve thought about it since the beginning of the game—I think everyone has—but even more so once I started...doing what I do.” She tightens her grip on his fingers. “I hunt players who have committed crimes against others, and I bring them to justice to the best of my abilities. Sometimes, I bring death knocking to their doorstep. When they attack and steal and kill, they mark themselves for retribution…” A shaky breath rattles in her lungs. “But murder is murder. So with every life I take, I wonder, when will my karma come to call?”

She bends one knee up to rest her foot on the railing, placing her free hand on her ankle and leaning her chin on her knee. “So yeah, I’ve thought about it. I figure it’s most likely that I’ll die cold and alone out in the middle of nowhere, with orange players swarming around my would-be corpse, fighting over whatever items I might’ve dropped.” One glance at his face cracks her up. “I know, morbid. But it’s true. I would consider it a mercy, albeit a selfish one, to die in the company of those I love.” Her lips twist into a wry grin. “Of course, the best option is to just not die at all!” A dry, cracked laugh escapes her lips. “But realistically, what are the odds?”

“You’ll live,” he says before she can get out another word. She looks at him oddly, but there’s a strange look in his eyes, a determination she hasn’t seen today. “You said you would follow me anywhere.”

A low chuckle escapes her at his words. Like her, he’s always been a pragmatic person, but even cynics are allowed some optimism, right? “So I did.”

“Um, am I interrupting something here?”

Karma throws a mock glare in Uzala’s direction, pouting at the young man leaning against the doorframe with a sly smirk.

“Whether or not I throw you off of this balcony in the next five seconds,” she says, enunciating each word clearly, “depends on if you have anything useful to contribute. Five.”

His smirk becomes slightly fixed. “Ehehe…”

“Four.”

“Y-you’re not serious, are you?”

She slides down from her perch on the balcony. “Three.”

He backs up a step with a nervous giggle. “Now, now-”

“Two.”

“H-hey, _danchou,_ a little help here?” Uzala squeaks out, doing his best impression of a deer in headlights as she stalks towards him like a lion stalking prey.

Heathcliff crosses his arms and leans back, wearing his typical stoic, very unsympathetic expression. “Who, me?”

“Oh, come on!”

“One,” Karma says, grinning, before she lunges, and he screams like a little kid.

\---

Heathcliff thinks about it later, when the clock has started a new day and his best lieutenant is somewhere out in his floating steel castle, courting Death with a smirk on her face.

_Sometimes, things just happen for no apparent reason._

Well, of course there’s a reason. Humans are irrational most of the time, but there’s almost always a reason, often multiple, however inane, behind every action.

He just never really figured out the exact reasons behind _that_ action.

With a sigh, he realizes his coffee mug is empty, and takes that as a cue to go to bed. His eyes linger on the words on the outside of the mug, full of snark. They both know his annoyance is just a facade; it almost always is.

So what was the reason that he met her here in Aincrad?

Of all the people he invited into his game world, of all the top players in the game, it was she who managed to get so close. Why did they meet in the first place?

If only it could last forever...then maybe he would be okay not knowing.

But there’s only one way this can end. And it _will_ end. He knows that she’ll see to it herself eventually.

They still have a little time, though, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll leave it up to you whether or not Karma actually threw Uzala off the balcony :)
> 
> (They're in a safe zone, so it wouldn't hurt anything but his dignity and pride, and Karma would say that he had none of that to begin with, so it's fine XD)
> 
> I can't claim the idea for Darkness Blade. I'm pretty sure the actual Unique Skill is a canon thing, but I couldn't find anything on what it actually did. Mostly, I included it because Karma and PoH basically oppose each other throughout the whole second half of SAO, so I figured I should have them clash head to head at least once. Oh, and I considered giving Darkness Blade to Karma (and I toyed with that in her and Heathcliff's conversation), but I decided against it.
> 
> Hope I didn't make it too unbelievable with Karma deciding to run away from PoH that time. Even if she decided to sacrifice herself, there wasn't a sure chance that she could kill him. On one hand, he is a really important enemy, but I also wanted Karma to have to make the choice to cut her losses and live to fight another day (and also live with the guilt and the what if's) at least once or twice.
> 
> (Also, I made that up about Heathcliff and his mother, though it was inspired by a wonderful fic called 'My Floating Castle' by LeaOotori. It's amazing :))
> 
> We're so close to the end! I can't believe it. I'm nervous and excited :)


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...this is it. (Not the last chapter, but)
> 
> If you can, you should listen to 'Sometimes Hearts Break' by Nathan Wagner. Actually, just...listen to all his songs while you're at it XD I recommend Don't Forget Me Pt. 1, Innocence, Lonely, Blood Bonds, You, Love, and Light.
> 
> I never actually write in order, so this is also one of the first chapters written XD I've been sitting on it for...well, months, at this point. So...why the long wait? Yeah. I'm wondering that too. Well, I did have to edit a lot, but that was mostly just me going 'hnnnn is this good is this bad should I leave it should I cut it is this too much or not enough?' And then for a week, I was 'editing' some more...read: cutting out one or two words, adding another ten here and there, biting my nails, and generally being an indecisive idiot XD
> 
> But no more waiting! (obviously)
> 
> Well...here we go.

_** Final Battle: 11/7/2024 ** _

Karma sticks her head in the door. “Hey, I’m gonna go on ahead to meet Asuna and Kirito-kun at the plaza.”

Heathcliff, who’s sitting back in his seat and staring off to the side, dressed in full armor, seemingly deep in thought, takes a moment to react. “Hmm? Yes, go ahead.”

She raises an eyebrow, sliding herself around the doorframe and nudging the door shut. Slouching back against the wall, leaning her weight on one leg with a laziness only she could get away with, she asks bracingly, “Everything alright?”

He sighs, straightening up. “As much as it can be.”

Of course, she gets where he’s coming from. They lost good men in the advance scout party that got wiped out by the boss. To top it off, they don’t even have any information on what the boss is like. It’s enough to make anyone a tiny bit antsy.

In a quiet clatter of armor, he rises to his feet. “Truth be told, I feel as if I can’t quite predict how this boss fight will go,” he admits quietly, looking down at his hands braced against the desk.

“Now you know how the rest of us feel,” she snarks, pushing out a hip with a wry smile. “Seriously, though, it’s not like you to worry. Not like this.”

He gives her a humorless smile. “I know,” he says, and his expression finishes his sentence for him: _I know, and I don’t like it, please help._

She moves closer. “So, what is it?” He’s never expressed any sort of trepidation before. And of course, Karma knows better than anyone that that doesn’t mean he didn’t feel it, but knowing it’s there, just not out in the open, and actually hearing him say it are very, very different things.

After a quiet moment, he raises his head to meet her gaze; for a moment, she can see into them clearer than she ever has before.

“I’m afraid this is the one where I lose you,” he says plainly.

Karma does probably the last thing he expected; she throws her head back and laughs. It’s not the kind that leaves her belly aching and her throat slightly raw, but it’s something she hasn’t been able to do since they got the scout report.

“Heathcliff,” she says affectionately, grinning at him, “you think I don’t feel that way about you and Asuna and everyone else I care about _every single time_ we walk into danger? In a rational way, I know we’re all _pretty_ good, but there’s _always_ that little part of me that worries.” Beaming, she continues, “I’m flattered that you’ve had so much faith in me to not die so far, but it’s not like you have a choice in whether or not I fight.” He opens his mouth, and she adds, “If the next word out of your mouth is ‘technically’, I will fight you.”

His expression morphs back into the familiar deadpan face that she’s so used to seeing, and she smirks, gently punching his armored shoulder.

“I get it,” she says warmly. “And it’s tough. But you’ve believed in me so far, so just keep doing that, okay? I’m not leaving anytime soon.”

\---

“Hey, you have a nice honeymoon, you two?” Karma asks cheerfully, bouncing down from the teleport gate to hug Asuna.

She’s glad to see that Asuna does look a little less worn out than before. For the past two years, she’s been a leading figure in the guild, and Karma finds it taxing just after two weeks. While Karma wouldn’t have necessarily picked her current ‘profession’ if she was given more choices, it gives her chances to get away from the guild, and the ranks and the bureaucracy and the formalities, and Asuna hasn’t had a chance until recently to do the same.

“Very nice,” Asuna agrees happily. “We went fishing this morning.”

“She slaughtered a giant lungfish,” Kirito puts in cheerfully, giving Asuna a puppy-like look that’s pure adoration, and Asuna grins, pink tinting her face, before turning back to Karma.

“So how’ve you been?”

“Bloody stressed,” she says bluntly, although she regrets it when guilt flickers across her expression.

“I’m sorry,” she murmurs, shoulders slumping slightly. “You were working so hard, and I-”

“No, don’t worry about it,” Karma interrupts, squeezing her shoulder reassuringly. “You deserved a break too. It just took some getting used to. You’re here now, and I’m sure they’ll be happy to have you back.”

Asuna looks at her with apprehension. “Did everything go okay?”

Karma takes a deep breath, trying not to think about the last two weeks too much. Not all of it was stress and exhaustion, though.

“Yeah. For the most part. I was just really busy. I had to train with everyone a lot in order to decide who we’re bringing to the boss fight. I couldn’t be relying on Uzala too much when it was my turn to take the army out...The fact that we don’t even know what kind of boss we’re up against doesn’t help. Then there’s the matter of PoH…”

Kirito’s gaze sharpens. “PoH? The leader of Laughing Coffin?”

“The commander tasked me with tracking him down. Xaxa and Johnny Black are behind bars, but their leader?” She grimaces, recalling that one fight she’d rather forget. “So far, it hasn’t been very fruitful. Especially since my attention has been so divided lately.”

“We’ll find a new sub-leader,” Asuna says confidently, only her copper eyes betraying lingering sadness for Godfree’s death. “I’ll resume command of team B. If anyone can catch that bastard, it’s you.”

She manages a small smile. “Oh, before I forget…”

Asuna smiles when Karma sends her a guild invite.

Suddenly, there’s a loud clanging noise, the sound of someone banging a sword on a shield. Silence falls over the courtyard as all attention is drawn to the Knights of the Blood Oath.

Karma gestures at Asuna, who squeezes Kirito’s hand before accepting the guild invitation and following her to stand with their guildmates.

\---

A flash of light is what catches Karma’s attention first, and her body moves even as her mind comprehends it.

With a sharp _CLANG,_ Karma forces Kirito’s sword to the side and holds up her blade protectively, bristling. “What do you think you’re doing?!” she demands furiously.

He grimaces, frustrated, indifferent to the scandalized and horrified stares directed at him from the rest of the raid party.

“Your commander,” he finally says, levelling a cold glare over Karma’s shoulder, “isn’t who you think he is.”

Karma narrows her eyes suspiciously. “What are you talking about?” she asks, tightening her grip on her sword. On the one hand, she instinctively leaps to defend her commander; on the other, Kirito rarely, if ever, does anything so rash without a reason he believes in.

A hand lands on her shoulder, and she glances up at Heathcliff in surprise. _“Danchou?”_

Instead of looking suspicious, or offended, or wary, he just looks curious, relaxed, his tone matching perfectly; it doesn’t sit right with her. “Yes, do explain, Kirito-kun.”

Kirito takes a deep breath, as if collecting his words. “All this time,” he begins slowly, “I’ve been wondering where he’s hiding, as he watches us live in the world he made. Then I realized that it’s just simple psychology. Even a kid could understand it—especially a kid. What’s more boring than watching other people play an MMO?”

He gestures with one sword at Heathcliff. “He’s protected by the system. That’s why his HP has never dropped to the yellow. Even if you hadn’t blocked me, Karma, I bet the system would’ve.” He turns his piercing stare on Heathcliff. “Isn’t that right, Kayaba Akihiko?”

Astonished mutters ripple through the boss room, but Karma is frozen in place.

“That’s impossible.” Her voice trembles weakly. “I’ve seen his HP drop. I’ve beaten him in a duel before. He’s _not—_ he’s—he’s my-” She whirls around to face her commander, voice cracking as she pleads, “Right? It’s not true, _right?”_

For the first time, his expression is totally unreadable. Almost mechanically, he lifts a hand to grasp her chin, running a thumb along her cheekbone, his eyes like reflective glass. She can see her own fear in them, and her breath rattles coldly in her chest at the actions of a stranger.

Heathcliff doesn’t stop her or even attempt to dodge when she draws her sword back and lunges, aiming straight for his head. He doesn’t have to.

She winces as her arm is jarred by the contact with the purple ‘Immortal Object’ disc, and her heart plummets into the pit of her stomach as she stumbles back, her sword dipping to clink softly against the stone floor.

He barely spares her a glance as he explains, and a hollow sense of despair expands in her chest, threatening to swallow her whole.

He was _lying._ He’s been lying to everyone, to Karma, for _two years._

And in order to escape this world, they’re going to have to kill him.

It’s funny, really. Yes, she fights on the front lines, and yes, she participates in all the boss battles...and yet, getting out of the game felt almost irrelevant at times.

_“It’s not a bad way to just live, compared to the real world.”_

_“I know. I feel the same way.”_

_Because I had you._

Uzala’s enraged voice tears through her thoughts, and she whirls around as he collapses to the ground, his sword flying out of his hands, body paralyzed. Surprised gasps issue from the players in rapid succession as they’re each inflicted by paralysis. Fuurinkazan falls like dominoes, Agil lands hard on his back with a metallic rattle, Asuna sways and collapses into the arms of Kirito, who is the only one without a little black lightning bolt on a yellow rectangle above his HP bar.

Heathcliff barely catches her sword on his shield in time, his eyes wide. His surprise drives her on, past the paralysis, as she hacks and slashes with a mad, cold fury. She can’t ever remember a time when she wished for someone to _die_ with such burning hatred—not in the Laughing Coffin raid, not when facing all the orange players she’s had to fight and sometimes _(often)_ kill, not even that fateful day, all the way back. She never wanted any of them to die.

She was always just scared back then. But right now, fear is the last thing on her mind.

_(He always gave her the strength to fight her fear, but this is different; when she forgot how to be scared, maybe that’s when she started to lose it)_

As far as she knows, she’s the only one he’s ever lost to in a duel. This time, she’s not going to hesitate to drive her sword through where his heart should be. And maybe he’s stronger than before, but so is she. The stakes are higher than they were then, and she’s the one to whom that kind of pressure is an old, old friend.

Even as they fight, he changes his status to mortal object, and his HP starts to go down little by little. Teeth bared, she drives on with her attacks more viciously than ever, each strike a killing blow, or intended to set one up. She stopped relying on the system to guide her movements when she realized from fighting other players that it made her predictable, and she’s glad she did. There’s no way her sword skills would work against the person that created them all.

He’s smiling, she suddenly realizes. He never smiles like this during combat.

The paralysis stiffens her body, and a wheezing grunt bursts out of her as he slams her with his shield, sending her flying. She digs her sword into the stone, pulling herself upright, but the paralysis won’t allow her to do much more, and she seethes in the unfairness of everything, absolutely livid. Heathcliff turns to look at her with that awful, mildly curious expression, and tilts his head.

“I knew you were strong,” he remarks, as if analyzing lab data, completely indifferent to her rage.

“I’ve spilled so much blood, thinking there was no other choice,” she whispers, voice shaking. “But if it weren’t for you, none of this would’ve had to happen!”

Her scream echoes dissonantly in the chamber, and the paralysis forces her to her knees, her sword clattering out of her grip. Heathcliff looks unperturbed, and simply rests his hands atop his cross shield.

“But before you joined me, you were so reticent. So timid. Oh, I don’t doubt you were sharp, but you’re so much stronger now than when I first met you, a scared little thing terrified of her own shadow. The you right now is brave, unafraid of making those hard choices, confident in herself.” She hates him for the note of pride in his voice, and herself for wanting it. “You said yourself that you could forget your regrets, all your bad choices.”

“That was different,” she snarls. “I didn’t _know.”_

“And now you do. So would you really give all of this up to go back to the way things were?”

She clenches her fists tightly, a bead of programmed sweat rolling down her temple as she struggles to even stay upright. He would probably say no. After all, it’s all the knowledge that he’s gathered over the years that allowed him to create this fantastical floating steel castle. If he had even a trace of hesitation, he wouldn’t have made this death game.

“Yes,” she answers, swallowing hard. “I would. All the experiences I’ve had, all the things I learned...I value them greatly. But...they cost me so much.”

And the whole time, she was by his side, a loyal comrade. She would’ve laid her life down for his any day of the last two years they’d all been locked in this death game, and she thought he would do the same. And perhaps he would’ve—at least in theory. But as Kirito said, he’s protected by the system. He was never in any danger. Everyone’s lives rest on the edge of a blade, but he’s the one who was always wielding that blade.

“I would give anything to be able to wash my hands clean,” she says quietly. “You would never understand.” Words she never thought she would have to say to him.

He nods slowly. “I see,” he says finally. “Once I leave for the Ruby Palace, the Knights of the Blood Oath will be under your command, Karma.”

She shakes her head. “As if I could be anything like the leader you were, _danchou.”_

He smiles, the same knowing smile he always gave her when encouraging her to be brave, to stand up to her fears. “I believe you can.” His armor clinks as he sinks to one knee before her so their eyes can meet levelly. “You said once that if I believed in you, you would follow me anywhere. Well, I do believe in you. And I’ll be waiting for you and your troops on the top floor.”

He places a gentle hand on her shoulder, and a sob forces its way through her clenched teeth. With all her might, she stretches her hand inch by inch towards her sword. Her fingers curl around the grip, and she lifts it slowly from the floor, jaw clenched. He notices, of course, but doesn’t make a move to stop her.

“It was an honor to fight by your side. You'll make a fine leader,” he tells her.

In a single breath, he makes her soar with pride and plummet in despair. Her focus wavers, the sword clinks metallically to the cold floor, and she lets her head hang as she admits defeat to the one person she thought would always be on the same side as her.

And even now, for some stupid reason, she can’t quite associate him with the word ‘enemy’.

She knows all too well that nothing is black and white, that everything is gray and silver or something in between, but she _never_ would’ve thought-

“You were family to me.” Her tears simply slide down the steel of his armor, unfelt.

She can’t bear to look at him, but she senses surprise from her commander (no matter what, he’ll always be her commander). He’s quiet for some time. At last:

“Thank you. For being here in my dream,” he says softly. “I’m proud of you.”

She clenches her fist in the material of his white cloak pooled on the floor around them, seething. But the only thing that comes out isn’t anger—it’s just misery.

“I hate you,” she chokes out in anguish.

“I know.”

He turns away then, and her fingers loosen from where they cling to his cloak and drop to the floor as he stands, leaving her behind without another glance.

Just _yesterday,_ he told her, old pain etched into his expression, how the world left his mother behind after her death.

And after all this time, after Karma waded through a sea of blood to stay by his side, he has the audacity to just turn his back on her?

She _promised._

_“If you believe in me, I’ll follow you anywhere.”_

He’s talking to Kirito now, she realizes, offering him a chance to duel for the fate of the game, and for all six thousand and then some lives still trapped within it. Kirito stares at the floor, numb; she can see the faces flashing in his mind’s eye, and she knows what he’s going to say. He’s that kind of person, he just is.

She could be thinking about how much it’s going to hurt Asuna should Kirito lose. She could be thinking about the future of the game if he loses and Heathcliff, the strongest player, leaves them all scrabbling in the dust to pick up the pieces.

She’s not thinking about any of that. Because she’s human, and when it comes to Heathcliff, she can be pretty goddamn selfish, and all she wants is to make him understand.

“No,” she declares, and both Heathcliff and Kirito turn to look at her.

She reaches for her sword again; if anything, the paralysis is _worse,_ but she’s fought it off thrice now, and she can do it again. The blade scrapes against the stone like nails on chalkboard as she drags it towards her, panting instinctively with the effort—more mental than physical, but gruelling, every inch, nonetheless.

“You’re mine,” she hisses, bracing her right hand on the cold ground, forcing herself to one knee.

Heathcliff’s detached expression of mild interest flickers as she plants her feet and pushes, driving her sword into the ground as a prop to shove herself up; every few seconds, her knees start to buckle, but she struggles past it relentlessly, slowly rising to her full height. It feels like standing up underneath the weight of the world—like she’s playing Atlas, in his words. But she would bear the weight of Aincrad on her shoulders if she had to in this moment, because nothing’s going to stop her now.

“If I have to fight you like this, I will,” she spits out, yanking her sword out of the ground. It is _excruciating_. There’s no pain, and it’s not even physical. No numbers and stats can overcome admin paralysis. This is just willpower, and her body is wracked with tremors each time she thinks she’s not enough. For him, though, whatever it takes, she’ll be enough—that hasn’t changed.

His voice is cool and even, betraying none of his thoughts. “This is not your battle to fight.”

“I don’t care. You can’t stop me. I promised to stay by your side,” she seethes, assuming her stance, trembling almost imperceptibly. “You’re not leaving me behind.”

Even as he opens his mouth to respond, the paralysis icon by her name flickers—not in its normal way that it does when the debuff just runs out or gets healed, but more like it’s glitching out. She bares her teeth in a shark-like grin as it vanishes altogether.

His eyebrows draw together like thunderclouds. “How did you do that?”

“Haven’t you noticed? When have I done it before? Think about it. You _know_. You were there, _every single time it happened.”_ She lets out a hoarse, high-pitched giggle, and she knows she sounds delirious and out of her mind, but she kind of feels like it; everything is twisted and she doesn’t know up from down anymore. “When I was captured and held hostage right before your eyes, when you were fighting that boss on Floor 50 by yourself for ten whole minutes, _just now_ when you ruined _everything…”_ Chest heaving, she snarls, “I only ever did it for you.”

The boss room is dead silent, save for cloth and armor rustling as she lifts her sword a little higher. Her limbs still shiver—not from paralysis anymore, just from the anticipation thrumming in her veins. Oh, how she is going to _enjoy_ plunging her sword into where his heart should be.

“They say love is the strongest thing in the world,” she sneers, lips curved upward, exposing a hint of white in a poor imitation of a smile. “I say they’re wrong.”

Love and hate, after all, are comrades. Partners in crime. Sisters in arms. Their real foe?

Indifference.

“Didn’t you say you’d never leave me?” he asks her, with a lonely tilt of his head.

She throws back her head, and laughs, and laughs, and laughs, until tears sparkle in her eyes and she has one arm braced across her stomach to support herself, feet planted on the ground while her body sways like a puppet with fraying strings.

He looks sad. It’s pathetic. Absurd.He has _no right._

Through bared teeth, she spits out, “You were the one who left _me.”_

Finally, _finally,_ he turns to her fully with a rattle of heavy armor, lifting his shield in preparation to face his retribution.

_That’s right...I’m_ your _karma._

“The last blood that I’ll have to spill in this game is going to be yours,” she whispers, and the puppet strings snap.

She lunges, her virtual muscles and numbers propelling her to close the gap in an instant. Sparks fly and metal screams as their blades clash with a horrible screech, _this was never meant to happen like this,_ and their weapons know it. Their feet kick up showers of dust and smoke, and they are both reminded of when the same would happen in mock duels, or even on the dance floor. They become mere blurs of white and black and red, light and shadow; they were always like that, but now, they stand on opposite sides of the field.

She cuts and slashes and stabs with a ruthless ferocity, a wildness he’s never seen in her before, and she takes his retaliatory attacks coldly, barely reacting to them and simply pressing forward, chipping away his HP in turn. The paths of their avatars are soon marked by trails of flaking red pixels, like blood spraying from wounds.

Asuna bites her lip hard, watching her best friend disintegrate at the hands of someone they both trusted explicitly, looked to for guidance. “Kirito-kun, help her,” she pleads, struggling to even turn her neck to look up at her lover.

Kirito presses his lips together, his arms tightening around Asuna. “I can’t,” he whispers, looking like he wants nothing more than to do so. “This isn’t my fight anymore.”

Heathcliff bats aside Karma’s sword with his shield and lashes out, and she sways back almost lazily, _letting_ his blade cut into her neck—shallowly, but enough to decrease her HP significantly. Teeth shining orange in the light of the torches, she simply continues in her attack, inexorable, and he feels something akin to _fear._

For the duration of the game, he’s been untouchable, but this strange fear isn’t foreign. He’s felt it before—when Karma and some other players were separated from the others on Floor 25, when she was held hostage by player-killers right before his eyes with a knife to her throat, when he watched the poison drain her HP within a single pixel of her life, when she threw herself at Laughing Coffin without a second thought to spare for her own safety-

It all comes back around to her. He’s still not sure how to feel about that. He’s still not sure how to feel about the fact that she makes him feel, like a normal human being. Not since…

It was never meant to last, he realizes, and that _hurts,_ because for a while, it felt...it _felt;_ that in itself was extraordinary and he clung to it. It’d been so long since he could feel anything but the same mere traces of emotions all the time. Compared to now, could they even be called emotions? It’d been so long since he could feel anything genuine, anything human, and once he could, he didn’t want to let it go. And even though it was doomed from the start, even though he _knew,_ he couldn’t help but try anyway because he could finally feel something more than nothing. And now-

In a rush of white and red, he lunges forward, shield-bashing her hard. She hits the ground on her side but flips upright in an instant, feet scrabbling at the stone to launch herself towards him yet again like some cornered feral animal. She doesn’t let them pause for even a second, like if she hesitates, he’ll disappear; her prey will disappear.

Their swords clash, and he locks the hilts together in an attempt to give them a second to breathe.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he demands, his gaze like molten steel burning. “Are you _trying_ to kill us both?”

She struggles to maintain her ground against his higher STR stats, but her expression is no less vicious for it. “Well, you tell me, _would you like to live with your soul in the grave?!”_

His eyes widen, and he falters for a split second when she tells him she’s trying to destroy herself. And she doesn’t _want_ to, no one wants to, and it’s not that she has nothing left to lose, it’s just that she can’t quite remember what she still has left to lose-

Her fist flies out, and as he reels, she resumes her relentless offense. Point by point, their HPs dip into the red; for every pixel that fades away from their HP bars, she can remember a memory they shared, and even a million pixels wouldn't be enough to count them all.

It takes her several minutes to realize that she’s crying, leaving behind crystalline tears in her movements, and she catches a teardrop in her hand numbly, watching the spot seep into the fabric. How many times did she go to him to cry, seeking comfort from him? It was barely two weeks ago when she nearly fell asleep weeping into his shoulder after Godfree died.

He’s just standing there, watching her, she realizes, a strange emotion on his face, and she can’t help but laugh through the tears dribbling down her face and the rage in her heart; it’s eating her alive, and she’s going to let it.

“I think I’m more Heathcliff than you are,” she tells him, snickering at the irony with teeth bared. “You may not have loved me, but _what_ right _had you to leave me?”_

For the first time in their fight, she ignites her blade with a flick of her wrist. The bright white steel drips with dark crimson light, and the sword skill launches her avatar into the sequence all on its own. She can see it in his movements as he sets his shield and his feet and blocks every strike; it’s all instinct, reacting involuntarily to the sword skills he designed.

_CRACK!_

The sword that has served her so faithfully shatters when the center of the shield meets the point perfectly—the shield’s version of an arms break. Her weapon is reduced to polygons within her grasp, although her momentum carries her forward-

Until she is jerked to a dead stop, his fingers brushing her sternum—right above where the KoB cross pendant lies—as the end of his weapon protrudes from her back, buried to the hilt in her chest.

Her legs give way beneath her, but Heathcliff lowers her to the floor, letting go of his sword to cradle her gently in his arms—one last courtesy. Static fizzles and pops in her ears. She feels a strange little impact when the pommel of his sword bumps against his armor, jolting her slightly.

She can see the last of her HP vanishing, she can see the HP bar fizzling out in the corner of her eye, she can see something dark gray and translucent, the visor of her NerveGear, and she can see tiled ceilings typical of a hospital. She can see the real world again, and she can hear the whine as her NerveGear prepares to fry her brain, but she’s not quite done here yet.

Karma wraps her arms around him, searching for warmth where there is none, letting her tears trickle down the cold crimson steel.

“From all these months of killing players,” she breathes, her right hand moving steadily through her menu, “from what you’ve done to me...I think the most important thing I learned…”

His body convulses. His last breath leaves him in one soft gasp.

When she takes her knife.

The same one that she used to kill the very first player she ever killed.

The same one that he picked up off the ground. And handed back to her. That day.

And plunges it into his back.

_He put a knife in her back and made to flee, but even gods can’t outrun karma._

He taught her everything she knows. He made her dangerous. He made her love him, and that was his undoing.

With a satisfied hum, she links her hands behind his back as the world begins to turn white, a faint static whine buzzing in her ears. “...is to never leave your back open.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You could tell from the intro that something (everything) was going to go horribly wrong, right? XD
> 
> So, slight canon divergence, but eh. The very first draft stopped at "I hate you" and had Kirito doing the fight like he did in canon, but then I realized that Karma would never stand for that. And Kirito definitely would've tried to help...but stepping between them would've been a literal death wish for anyone.
> 
> (This was where the whole beating the paralysis thing finally came in again, by the way ;))
> 
> In case you couldn't tell, I just loved building up that irony XD "They still have a little time, right?" Nope. "I'm not leaving, okay?" Mmmhmm. "I have a feeling this isn't going to go well." YOU DON'T SAY.
> 
> Oh, and the italicized dialogue that Karma says to him are quotes from Wuthering Heights. That book has so many good ones. The whole "You may not have loved me, but what right had you to leave me?" was originally "You loved me—then what right had you to leave me?" in the book. And it was one of Heathcliff's lines in the book, hence Karma saying, "I think I'm more Heathcliff than you are." Oh, and book!Heathcliff was also the one who said, "Would you like to live with your soul in the grave?"
> 
> Coming from the author, this probably sounds weird, but I can't quite tell if she's completely lost her mind or not. She definitely snapped quite a bit, though. Like, major existential crisis. He was basically her entire mental stability support throughout SAO (yes, she had Asuna, but Heathcliff was the one who really understood her constant internal conflict, definitely not for lack of trying on Asuna's part, but because he was the only one she told things to). He'd even started to open up to her recently, and then, even worse than him dying or something, he tells her that 'yeah, actually, the whole time, it's been me stabbing you in the back and then hiding the knife and comforting you, wash, rinse, repeat'.
> 
> ...This feels very surreal.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I've been sitting on this for way too long. So last chapter, here we go.
> 
> Thank you to those who commented and gave me feedback last chapter! I couldn't believe my eyes XD I guarantee you, every single time, I sat there rocking back and forth in my seat with this absolutely massive, goofy grin on my face for a good few minutes when I first read all your kind words, thank you so much! :)
> 
> Try listening to 'Hindenburg Lover' by Anson Seabra. I think it's kind of perfect for where their relationship is at right about now, to be honest. Also, 'Open Your Eyes' by Snow Patrol is like the PERFECT song for Wuthering Heights.

_** A Choice to Understand: 11/7/2024 ** _

When she opens her eyes, light pours into her vision. It’s slightly piercing to her eyes, but if she squints, she can make out a vague, crumbling shape, down far, far below, through the wispy white clouds, above an abyss-like void. She steps closer, wanting a better look, although she thinks she knows what it is.

“That was well-played in the end.”

The voice is different, but Karma can recognize the tone and its owner anywhere. She glances over to see Kayaba Akihiko standing a few meters away, watching his creations crumble to pieces. She stares at him, at his real appearance, for a few moments, then looks back down.

“Somehow, I think I liked your Heathcliff avatar more. It sold that beautiful lie a little better,” she says aloud, watching as the Town of Beginnings splits down the middle.

He hums softly in acknowledgement, his neatly-pressed lab coat rippling in the wind. He looks so different—twig-like compared to Heathcliff, with short brown hair and a more pointed jaw—not much like a leader. Yet the calm, contemplative look, even in the face of the destruction of everything he worked for, is the exact same as Heathcliff when they faced down the Skull Reaper just now, or the Laughing Coffin players, or endless waves of monsters, or the Floor 50 boss, or those raptors on Floor 25, or the dire wolf that was moments away from killing Karma on Floor 1.

Together. They did it all together, all of it.

“So what do you want?” she asks quietly, turning to face him.

He blinks slowly at her, his eyes the same exact metallic shade than Heathcliff’s. “To offer you a choice.”

“...For what?”

“To move on. Or to go back.”

She opens her mouth immediately _(she doesn’t want to live with her soul in the grave)_...but she finds herself hesitating.

“...You killed me. Why am I getting a choice when no one else did?” She can think of a couple thousand other players who deserve it more than she does.

The corner of his lips twitches. “It’s purely selfish, I assure you. So what do you think?”

Her teeth clench so hard she thinks they might break, and a tight feeling squeezes around her throat—that same kind that comes when she watches a comrade helpless to dodge as she herself is too far away to do a thing. That same kind that comes from hearing the casualty statistics—no matter how high or how low, that feeling never fails to surface. It feels like it did before—that distinct sensation of having lost something so precious.

“I think,” she whispers, “that I can’t trust anything you say anymore.”

He chuckles humorlessly and gestures at his crumbling castle. “I’m losing everything I spent my life working for. What do I have left to hide?”

“That’s not the point!” she snaps, teeth bared. She tries to take a moment to recompose herself, but her breathing refuses to even out. Strange, since when did she feel the need to put on that mask around him? “I relied so heavily on you. You were the only one I could let my guard down around.” She shakes her head slowly, the unfairness of it all tasting bitter in her mouth. “And then you went and turned it all upside down.

“You didn’t care about all the lives you took with Aincrad. You bowed your head in grief when you heard the casualties, told us all that their deaths were not in vain, and that we’d find a way to prevail.” Her hands tremble. “But that was all a lie, wasn’t it? There was no remorse there. No empathy. So what else? What else was just a lie? An act? How do I even know if any of it was real?!”

Heathcliff—Kayaba stares steadily at her, metallic gaze unwavering, and she can’t help but see the similarity between the two. There’s never any pity in his gaze. And now she knows why. If there was any sort of regret, ever, he would never have made this death game. There’s only understanding—full knowledge of what he’s done and of the consequences of his actions.

“You don’t,” he finally says, with a tiny shrug as if in agreement. “But you heard what Kirito-kun said. Why would I want to simply watch while others immersed themselves in this virtual reality world I made? They lived their real lives in here, they lived true to themselves, even if it wasn’t always pretty. I wanted to do the same.”

He turns to smile wistfully at the crumbling castle as if it was an old friend—not an inaccurate assumption, really. “It’s true, I had to play as Heathcliff in order to make sure the game progressed on track towards the 100th Floor. But I wanted to live in this world too. Anything could happen. After spending so much time with just numbers for company, I wanted to experience the unpredictability of the human factor. I wanted to see it for myself. I wanted to be surprised. And I was.

“Whatever you think of me,” he continues calmly, “I assure you, I am not as good of an actor as you probably think. Believe me or don’t, but I truly enjoyed my time in SAO fighting at the head of the Knights of the Blood Oath, and watching all of you unite under pressure and grow stronger together. And I _never_ lied when I said that I believed we could find a way to prevail.”

She wishes she could believe him. And some part of her, that part of her that clings to the warmth and the memories they shared once, does believe him, no matter how much the rational part of her says she shouldn’t. What is _wrong_ with her?

She balls up fistfuls of her cloak, missing the familiar weight of her sword at her hip, and takes a deep, deep breath. To distract herself, she demands, “Why did you even do all of this anyways? Just to ‘experience the unpredictability of the human factor’? You could’ve done that without all of this death game crap, you know. We were living just fine in the real world.”

Even now, the words fall a little flat. When’s the last time she had as much fun in the real world as she has in the virtual one? Never before has she found so many of her equals, made so many friends and found a family she loves like she did in Sword Art Online. It’s the kind of love she would risk her life for—the kind that she _has_ risked her life for. The realization that she feels more alive here than she ever remembers feeling in the real world only deepens the hollow feeling in her chest.

Kayaba just counters with another question. “Why do you think?”

Karma thinks about that. She dredges up what precious little she knows about him, realizing that really, it’s not much. She thought she knew him, but when she can’t be sure how much of him wasn’t a lie, there’s not much left behind.

“You said you picked Heathcliff because he wanted revenge. And you told me about your mother. I figured you just wanted revenge against the world, even though that would be seriously stupid and narrow-minded, but hey, you do you.”

He has the gall to actually chuckle at that. “Ah, I am going to miss your sharp tongue. I suppose you’re not entirely wrong...but it’s not that simple.” Taking a deep breath, he looks back down at his crumbling castle. “I just...wanted to feel something again.”

She waits for him to elaborate, confused by the vague answer. When it doesn’t seem like an explanation is on the way, she asks bluntly, “What does that mean?” She never had to be afraid to ask him a question, and she refuses to start now.

His shoulders lift and fall as he inhales and exhales. “It’s been almost twenty years since my mother killed herself, and for the longest time…” His metallic eyes are oddly blank as he stares at the crumbling castle. “My father hated it when I cried.” He takes a deep, halting breath. “So eventually, I...shut it off. And I never learned how to turn it back on.

“It didn’t bother me for a while. That was the point. And then I met her, in college.” He blinks slowly down at the abyss. “We were together for some time. She’s the one taking care of me when I FullDive. But the whole time, I couldn’t figure it out.” And for a genius intellectual like him, it drove him crazy, and he stopped at nothing to understand.

“And then I remembered the dream I had when I was a boy. I dreamed of a floating steel castle, where a single sword can take you anywhere.” There’s a strange, almost soft look in his eyes now. “I thought, maybe I’ll recreate my dream, make it real. Maybe that’ll get me somewhere...It did, in a way. I met you, after all.”

He looks at her with a strange half-smile. “I was drawn to you that way. I met you, and you were...everything I couldn’t be.” He dips his head briefly before tipping his gaze back in her direction in an almost rueful way. “When you love, you love recklessly, with all your heart. And I was so jealous.”

A strange sense of pity stirs in her, and she draws her cloak around her tighter. This game has made her do a lot of soul-searching for what being human even means, after every monstrous thing she’s done. To be able to feel genuine emotions and express them is a big part of what it means to be human, in her humble opinion.

It is a great treasure to be loved, but just as great a treasure to be able to love—that, she knows now better than ever. How long was he without either?

“You were always alone for so long,” she murmurs quietly, staring at Aincrad. “No wonder you could never lay the past to rest.”

Because she gets it _(whatever souls are made of, theirs seem to be the same)_. She’s lost too, and it’s hard to keep going. But she had her family, without whom she would’ve never been strong enough to stand back up after falling. Was there truly no one to help him up?

She hears a sharp intake of breath. “Soon, it won’t matter anymore,” he whispers, and it might be her imagination, but she thinks she hears his voice shake too.

“Would you do it again, if you could?” _Would you hurt me again, if you could?_

“Every time,” he answers unhesitatingly, and she bites back a sob; she doesn’t want him to see her cry anymore.

He turns to look at his crumbling steel castle again, then smiles brokenly at her. “I don’t regret it, but…” He hesitates briefly, looking uncertain, before he meets her eyes again. “Perhaps it would’ve been better if I hadn’t cared for you. If I truly didn’t care, perhaps you wouldn’t have been hurt so much.”

She recoils at that, biting her cheek as hard as she can as tears well in her eyes anyways. “You didn’t care.” But fake or not, she does not even want to imagine a world in which that warmth didn’t exist.

“I did,” he insists, and she squeezes her eyes shut bitterly. “I know you don’t believe me, but I did. And I still wouldn’t change a thing, even if I could,” he declares, his voice soft but unyielding, just like Heathcliff’s. “I don’t regret my choices, I don’t wish I could take them back. But I can still feel guilty...I think.” He touches his chest above his heart absently, looking mildly confused. “It was too late for me to undo everything by the time I realized I cared about you.”

“And when was that?” she chokes out, glaring at the void beneath her through watery eyes, sniffling weakly.

He shakes his head slowly, as if bitter at himself. “A long time ago, when I should’ve seen it even before that.”

“And would you? Undo everything?”

He hesitates, hands curling in front of himself as if seeking answers where there are none. “We were both happy, weren’t we?” Her silence is enough of an answer on her part, and he sighs. “Then no. I don’t think I would’ve undone anything.” Even if it would’ve meant protecting her from himself, because he’d finally found what he was looking for.

“You’re just selfish,” she whispers, and he spreads his arms briefly with a resigned smile.

“Aren’t we all?” With weariness etched into his voice, he says, “It’s human nature to want more than we can ever have. None of us are exempt from that in the long run.”

But in the short run…

Because of him, in a game that was crawling with monsters, not all of them AIs, blood staining her hands red forever, there were still moments when she truly did not want for anything more.

And because of him, for the rest of her life, she will always be wanting what she cannot have.

At the sound of footsteps, she looks up as he approaches her. “So will _you_ move forward? Or will you let it end here?”

There’s a certain challenge in his voice; it’s the same tone that she used when trying to cajole him onto the dance floor, or into a practice duel. It’s the tone that says ‘I bet you can’t’ and it makes her want to prove him wrong, even though he’s a hypocrite.

Her fists clench by her sides, and she looks down at Aincrad. She can see Granzam, and she watches the castle crumble, along with a year’s worth of memories. Giltstein and Nolfret...their bases there have already disintegrated too. She remembers moving in, sprinting through the halls with Asuna, whizzing down the stair banisters, picking out rooms and setting up little personal affects, adding pictures to the desk in their room whenever they took a new one on their record crystal…

She remembers her promise, to follow him anywhere, and she knew, even back then, that she would follow him to the world’s end and to death if she had to.

“I’ll keep going,” Karma finally says, lifting her chin. “You’re not worth everything.”

Approval glints in his eyes; she hates herself for wanting it.

“Time to go, then,” is all he says.

It’s the truth. And yet, it also feels like the biggest lie she’s ever told. There are things she still hasn’t lost, aren’t there? She still has Asuna and Uzala. She still has Kili, Muldar and Fultz, Sanza, Segro, Kirito, everyone. She still has her best friend Megu, in the real world, and her parents, and hopefully her cat too. She was just given another chance to keep living and loving. Right?

Heathcliff might not be everything, but he was _her_ everything.

And he won’t be with her anymore. He’s going to walk off in his white lab coat and leave her behind, like everyone else they’ve lost, like what his mother did to him. But it’s not the same, is it? Even with the people they’ve lost, they still have the memories, don’t they? The times they spent together, living their lives as honestly as they could, but-

But if he was lying—if _he_ was a lie—then what did these past two years mean? Their lives were so intertwined from the start of the game. Those days before he found her were filled with fear and false bravado, and she’d rather not think about those. What can she even hold onto when she goes back to the real world?

Can’t she just stay here in Aincrad? She knows she can’t, because she wouldn’t settle for lies, but she wishes she didn’t know. Ignorance is bliss, is that how it goes? Maybe they felt sad sometimes, but they were happy a lot of the time too, weren’t they? She fell so easily into that content happiness. Where is she ever going to find that again, if not in this floating steel castle, where dreams come to life?

“I loved your virtual world,” she admits, _and I loved you too_. Her voice is small and weak, not unlike how she was before she met him. “I don’t want to leave.” Heathcliff won’t be coming with her.

“I don’t want to leave either.” This, at least, is one thing that Kayaba can empathize with.

He reaches out to grip her shoulder, and she tries to draw comfort from the action, like she has so many times before. The gesture is supposed to be one of companionship, but she only feels more alone than ever.

“Believe in yourself, and follow your instincts,” he tells her. “They’ll take you anywhere you want to go. I know you have the potential to do amazing things.”

A sob presses from inside her throat as she recognizes the mockery of her very own words, mimicked and spoken back to her, one last time.

_“If you believe in me, I’ll follow you anywhere.”_

“I miss Heathcliff,” she whispers in grief, wrapping her arms around herself in a feeble effort to keep what’s left of her hope from leaving her.

Kayaba’s smile is just a little bit miserable. “I do too.”

His hand lowers to grasp her arm briefly, then returns back to his side. Once they turn to walk their separate paths, she’ll probably never see him again no matter how much she might wish it, and it’ll be up to her to draw her own conclusions and decide what to believe.

With one final nod, he turns and leaves, hands tucked away in the pockets of his lab coat. He seems to know where he’s going.

Unseen by him, she raises one hand to her temple, one last time, and gives an informal, two-fingered salute.

When she blinks, he’s gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No happy endings here :D
> 
> So...this has been a ride XD
> 
> I've always been scared out of my mind to start posting stuff online, or even share it with some of my closest real life friends. Most of them don't even know I write (and in a way, sharing it online is way less stressful XD), so I'm really glad I talked myself into it. One of my friends of several years was recently like 'yeah, I write' and I was like 'yOu dO?!' And I bugged her for like only two seconds before she was like 'sure I'll share it with you', so that got me thinking XD
> 
> So to everyone who reviewed, commented, left favorites, kudos, followed, subscribed, gave me wonderful feedback...THANK YOU. I know I've gotten to be a much better writer because I know that other people are reading. Writing for myself is definitely fun (I wouldn't do it if it wasn't...hence my graveyard of abandoned WIPs XD), but writing for other people is a different kind of fun. It made me think about every choice I was making with regards to the plot and the characters and everything, and while I know I missed quite a bit...well, let's just put it this way: if I was just writing this for me, I would've left all the rough first drafts (that you definitely don't want to see) as the final versions, and that would've been, um, not so pretty. So thank you thank you thank you, I can't even find the words to express how grateful I am! :) *insert tons of less than 3 heart emojis*
> 
> Ahem. Sequel? Uhhhhh we'll see...I'm trying to figure some stuff out XD We'll see.
> 
> Thank you so much, again! :)


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